Alannon

3 new badges.... 50 costumes to get them...

I hope Archon Ascendant costume will be one of them.

Nearly 3 months later.... any updates for the tactics you use?

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I can say this as I have all the badges,

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Do you ever feel a sense of exhaustion at the thought of more badges coming out each release?

It's probably that way to keep some playing just to complete their favorite badger. That just might be the driving force behind some staying with this game versus going to another game.

I know some that have all but just a few badges on their main badgers. I'm sure some of them are probably obsessed with getting those last few....

Then, a new issue comes out and voila! They have to go get those too. It's just like the whole MMORPG concept. There's never a point where you say "I'm done! I've completed this game, time to move on!".

Anyone here old enough to remember Soul Train?

That was when you knew Saturday Morning Cartoons were over...

The Tank Mages were and still are fun group. PuG's that ended up filling spots for us were amazed.

Anyway, I've been thinking of a few other ST's that could work. Some of them border on Theme teams though:

1) Mostly Spines/Dark Armor scrappers with support defenders.

5 spine/dark scrappers
2 kinetic/dark defenders
1 sonics/* defender (optional... if no present, 6 spines/dark scraps)

Spines/dark scrappers have incredible damage output, but horrendous endurance usage. a few pro's and cons:

[u]Pros:[u]
lots of AoE damage output from the scrappers
excellent psionic defense
stacked oppressive gloom and stacked cloak of fear takes out minions and maybe lts
kin defs could take dark blast secondary for tohit debuff + cone immb, plus more disorient (dark pit)
kin defs could use IR + siphon speed + speed boost to allow entire team to skip travel powers
fulcrum shifting the scrappers AoE would be massive damage
dark can self heal (only if other enemies nearby)
stacked toxic dmg (rarely resisted), plus -recharge and slowing from spines

[u]Cons:[u]
both spines and dark armor are endurance management nightmares.
scrappers would be EXTREMELY dependent upon kin defs for endurance problems
if no kin defs online, scrappers may be reluctant to start teams until some do log in due to end problems and heals (until dark regeneration power)
even if taking stamina, would still need defs for end problems later, as stamina doesn't solve spine/darks problems with end usage
most would want to play scrappers and not be buffbots due to recent superteam events
dark armor does not provide knockback protection, so they would have to take acrobatics or expensive IOs.
only debuffing on AVs would be the -regen component of transfusion
kins would have to SB all once every 2 minutes


2) Spines/regen scrappers + sonic/dark defenders

6 spine/regen scrappers
2 sonic/dark defenders


[u]Pros:[u]
regen has better-than-stamina recovery by level 4, not nearly as many endurance issues, maybe no need for stamina (more power choices)
regen has incredibly fast health regeneration (obviously)... will take a mighty alpha strike to overwhelm before could heal
regen has built in kb protection, no need for acrobatics (more power choices)
regen has MoG (controversial), but can be a near invincible mode for 3 minutes
regen has many self heals, including artificial HP boost for taking alpha strikes
sonic defs add dmg resistance (the only real hole in regen), 3 at low levels or 2 at high levels will cap resistance
sonic have mez protection (not really needed by scraps after integration, but good for other defs), which has add res
sonic can debuff dmg resistance on bosses and AVs and Giant monsters with sonic siphon and disruption field
sonic can debuff defense with liquify
sonic secondary would be dark blast, same pros as above (tohit debuff, cone immob, dark pit disorient, etc)
if no defs on, spine/regen scrappers can continue fighting, although at a slower pace
stacked toxic dmg (rarely resisted), plus -recharge and slowing from spines

[u]Cons:[u]
quick recovery *might* not take care of all end problems, might need to get IO bonuses for recov or go conserve power epic
sonics will have to selectively run toggles until they get stamina (unless including rads or kins)
scrappers would have to run most leadership toggles by themselves until sonics get stamina
sonics would have to reapply shields once every 4 minutes


3) All fire/storm controllers

8 fire/storm controllers


[u]Pros:[u]
One AT, same primary and secondary powersets. No division of duties, no primary dmg dealers or support
fire cages have anti-knockback component, making storm a very viable set
steamy mist stacking: unslotted for resistance and 5 will cap res to fire/cold/energy
steamy mist stacking: fully slotted for defense, and 8 will have nearly 45% def to all (stacked with maneuvers=75%)
steamy mist stacking: 5 will effectively give group invis
freezing rain stacking: 3 will floor enemy defense
freezing rain stacking: 8 will almost floor enemy dmg resistance
freezing rain stacking: 8 freezing rains, combined with the debuffing, can cause a lot of AoE dmg
multiple flashfire disorients for openers, can stack with lightning clap
stacked hotfeet in melee range after disorient and fire cages
2 stacked snow storms can floor recharge and movement speed
24 imps on a full team after lvl 32
8 tornadoes (after locking down with fire cages), adds to imp damage and disorients any unlikely survivors
8 lightning storms for end drain, dmg, AVs, GMs, or personal bodyguards
bonfire could be viable if applied after fire cages, has 75% of hotfeet dmg, and that's before the massive dmg res debuff from freezing rain
no need for hurricane (with stacked steamy mist and maneuvers), more power choices

[u]Cons:[u]
bad endurance problems
would have to selectively run toggles before stamina
would have to probably take primal forces epic for conserve power or get lots of IOs with recovery bonuses
not as fast as frads
could cause some bad knockback if players forget to spam fire cages in fights and before using storm powers

(This one could be modified to allow kinetics or radiationists in to help with endurance issues, but then the team would lose some of the storm stacking advantages, and team coordination issues arise ... which is the problem with all multi-AT or multi-powerset teams)


4) All Plant dominators

8 plant/* dominators

[u]Pros:[u]
Plants get cone confuse power at lvl 8
plants get +regen power early (lvl 12) To help with healing
plants get pseudo pets with carrion creepers at lvl 26
plants get melee pet at 32
possibility of perma domination with IO recharge bonuses by late 30's
if taking psi secondary, end and heal buff with drain psyche, or good mini-nuke at lvl 38
if taking fire secondary, get a fire dmg multiplier, plus DoT
if taking ice secondary, slowing effects plus cold dmg (not as resisted)
if taking thorn secondary, -defense debuff and AoE
if taking energy secondary, powerboost increases confusion, hold, immob, etc

[u]Cons[u]
could have end problems while domination is down and before stamina
confuse powers might drain a small percentage of xp
tight builds, hard to fit in leadership toggles
spirit tree might be detrimental to some users' graphic performance
2 recent villain-side STs may have burned out ST regulars from another villain side team for now

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A small update to the thread in general.

I got my first Shivan with Dancing Hawk last night.

At any rate, I'm pleased with the results of having finally gone to get a Shivan and used it to do some missions that would've been otherwise impossible for me. Other TA/As might have better luck due to different builds (Hover would probably make fighting EBs a lot easier, but i'm still adamant about not deviating from my concept, so no Hover for me), but in my experience, EBs were just that wall that TA/As hit and couldn't get over, under, around or go through. Shivans aren't nearly as difficult to acquire as some people think they are, not even for a silly TA/A with no travel power, and they make those impossible walls crumble.

Go make a green blobby friend. You won't regret it. Don't use it as a crutch, that's not going to help you be a "better" player or TA/A, but do use it to get through the rough parts of the games, like Elite Boss encounters, or when that nasty Council lieutenant turns into a boss warwolf (might as well be an AV as far as TA is concerned... rotten, nasty mutts).


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I ran with a team of all TA/* defenders a while ago on Freedom (most were TA/A's, but a few had other secondaries). Shivans really did come in handy in tough spots, taking aggro and helping the DPS.

Before that, I had run on a team of mostly warshades and Peacebringers (with a few trollers thrown in here and there), and we had to use shivans a lot more in the end game to help with AVs.

Those shivans are nice temp power to have, but don't get too used to them.

After reading this, plus the linked nostalgia thread, I'm feeling like I really missed out on something special those first 3-4 months. Anyone else feeling this way?

I remember playing between early Dec2004 through early Feb2005.

During that time, I remember being accused of kill-stealing in Atlas.

I remember swarms of people playing in the Hollows

I remember being on hunting parties in Perez (the place was swarming with players back then).

I remember going to King Row, and dying almost instantly.

I remember the first time I team, thinking "Wow! This is a lot of action!"

I then remember shutting my account down for a year because I was afraid it was going to be too addictive.

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Last I knew, you only needed 4 SOs in AM to make it perma, assuming you also had perma-Hasten (which similarly only needs 5 SOs to be perma if you have perma-AM).

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Wow, sounds like a totally different world pre-ED.

I'm kinda glad I missed that mega-nerf. I now think I understand why so many left.

sonic/energy is a fantastic combo

The sonic powers debuff dmg resistance, as a lead in to the very damaging bone crusher, energy punch total focus follow-ups.

And the different powers stack dmg resistance debuff.

It's been my experience that you can't get the jet pack from the Atlas bank job until you've leveled and trained to level 6 (not 5). I remember having to do it 3 times on one character before he got the jetpack.

On a partially unrelated note, at the AMD booth this year at CES2007, I saw a section playing different video games. I was surprised to see City of Heroes playing (a fire/fire tanker running around PI). Captured a short video of it on my camera. Was surprised to see a 3 year old game showing side by side with the latest games (and some beta).

Has anyone tried to get Elude near perma with IO recharge bonuses?

Wow, not a lot of warning... and we have the double xp weekend challenge too:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat....rt=all&vc=1

When running with all fire/* corrupters superteams earlier in the year, I found myself using RoF much much more than inferno for melting groups.

I was fire/kin corrupter, but I also teamed with fire/darks a lot. Not much better than seeing a tar patch at the corner, pulled groups get stuck on it, running in, fulcrum shifting the group, hit RoF. Wow! Also, others started doing this as well. It almost made me want to respec out of inferno to pick up another power, since I was so rarely using it, but I kept inferno for that odd time when we'd be overwhelmed, and I'd already fired off RoF, and needed to get them away or dead.

I'd say I used 1 inferno for ever 15 or 20 times I used RoF.

Of course, on a blaster side, it's not quite the same. Ice Patch can help with holding them in place, but I would quickly miss the fulcrum shifting. Build-up + Aim + Assualt + pop some reds might come close.

Try this experiment:

make a trick arrow/archery defender, or a sonic/sonic, and give it a name like "yes I R healorz", and see how fast you get kicked from a team after getting invited and no green glowing goodness is seen from you.

Couldn't get Drum or Drumlow to work.

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Where is Stryke Force's page? Isn't that half the server right there?

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www.stryke-force.com

better link:

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/g...adFeature/1118

I didn't see this on the boards (maybe I just missed it), but here are some new screenshots from Cryptic showing new styles of wings, a little more on inventions and what looks like green Hamidon mito spamming aura heals:

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm?g...118&bhcp=1

Ah, forget my last post on the gunslingers using MM/thugs. With the announcement of a forthcoming pistol set for Corrupters (and possibly other ATs), we'll have more flexibility.

Also, the 3 pistol powers in the thug MM set are Lethal damage type, which is some of the highest resisted damage in later levels, so they would become more and more dependent on the /traps secondary.

Name: The Gunslingers
Shard: CoV
Overview: A group of Malta Gunslingers go their own way from the rest of the Malta group to make a name for themselves.

I've always thought that the Malta Gunslingers were cool to watch (and tough to fight), and wanted to have a hero like that. Well, we don't have that option (yet) on the heroes side, but we can simulate it with the villains. Petless Masterminds using the thug and traps powerset can do this. And, it shouldn't be too hard to make a gunslinger-style outfit using pictures for reference:

http://coh.warcry.com/scripts/images...81&site=36

High points:
- pistol wielders
- lots of 'gadgets'
- group buffs via heals and defense and mez protection
- high damage resistance

Powersets:
Thugs/Traps

From the thugs category:
- Pistols
- Dual Wield
- Empty Clips
(skip the rest, those are the thug pets, gunslingers don't need no stinkin' thugs to help!)

From the secondary:
- all but Detonator (since that is for the pets)

Powerpools
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Travel: I'd go with leaping here for the eventual acrobatics knockback protection. Gunslingers in the game use teleport. It's a matter of personal preference

Fitness:
Gotta have stamina, so take hurdle or swift (Hurdle if using superjump) and health

Leadership:
- Assault (added damage, times 8 teammates = 63% increase)
- Tactics (nearly 94% increase in accuracy when all 8 have it and fully slotted)
- Vengeance - gunslingers have a code of honor and when a teammate falls, it's up to them to dispense vigilante justice! - 41% accuracy increase, plus ~20% defense increase

Fighting:
- Boxing or Kick, with kick you have knockback, with boxing you have disorient, either of which will be pumped up if you invoke vengeance. Boxing may give you more time to fight without reprisal if you slot for disorient duration
- Tough - 21% smashing and lethal damage resistance (fully slotted)
- Weave - 7% more defense (fully slotted) on top of the 14% fully slotted defense from the forcefield gen (which is also a mez protection)... not sure if you can run multiple ff gens at once but if so, then 8 times that too, or stagger them out so they last longer, 4 at a time maybe?

Patron Pool:
Black Scorpion - Mace mastery
The only thing that really fit the motif was the shield, which if fully slotted, would be a 20% resistance and 17.5% defense boost.

Tactics, go in, guns a'blazing! drop mortars and trip mines at corners and do the classic pull technique. Drop ff gens just before a fight. This increases defense and is a mez protection. Set triage beacon to heal if things go bad. Open with the cone attack (empty clips).

Seeker drone doesn't really fit the motif, so that might be swappable for something else.

The one bad thing about this petless build is that the inherent Supremacy power isn't used, due to having no pets.


Sample build:

Name: Gunslinger
Level: 50
Archetype: Mastermind
Primary: Thugs
Secondary: Traps
---------------------------------------------
01) --> Pistols==> Dmg(1) Dmg(3) Acc(11) Dmg(37)
01) --> Web Grenade==> Acc(1) Immob(5) Range(17)
02) --> Dual Wield==> Dmg(2) Dmg(3)Dmg(37) Rechg(46)
04) --> Caltrops==> Slow(4) Dmg(5) Range(33) Rechg(39)
06) --> Triage Beacon==> Heal(6) Heal(7) Heal(7) Rechg(9)
08) --> Empty Clips==> Dmg(8) Dmg(9) Acc(13) KB_Dist(36) Range(40) Rechg(48)
10) --> Assault==> EndRdx(10) EndRdx(11) EndRdx(34)
12) --> Combat Jumping==> DefBuf(12) DefBuf(13) DefBuf(34) EndRdx(46)
14) --> Super Jump==> Jump(14) Jump(15) Jump(15) EndRdx(46)
16) --> Hurdle==> Jump(16) Jump(17) Jump(37)
18) --> Health==> Heal(18) Heal(19) Heal(19)
20) --> Stamina==> EndMod(20) EndMod(21) EndMod(21)
22) --> Acrobatics==> EndRdx(22) EndRdx(23) EndRdx(23)
24) --> Force Field Generator==> DefBuf(24) DefBuf(25) DefBuf(25) Rechg(27) EndRdx(40)
26) --> Tactics==> TH_Buf(26) TH_Buf(27) TH_Buf(29) EndRdx(29)
28) --> Seeker Drones==> Dmg(28) Dmg(31) Acc(31) Rechg(34)
30) --> Boxing==> DisDur(30) Dmg(31)
32) --> Tough==> DmgRes(32) DmgRes(33) DmgRes(33) EndRdx(43) EndRdx(45)
35) --> Vengeance==> TH_Buf(35) DefBuf(36) Heal(36)
38) --> Trip Mine==> Dmg(38) Acc(39) KB_Dist(39) Dmg(40) Dmg(43)
41) --> Scorpion Shield==> DmgRes(41) DmgRes(42) DefBuf(42) DefBuf(42) EndRdx(43)
44) --> Acid Mortar==> Dmg(44) Acc(45) Rechg(45)
47) --> Poison Trap==> Hold(47) Hold(48) Slow(48)
49) --> Weave==> DefBuf(49) DefBuf(50) DefBuf(50) EndRdx(50)
---------------------------------------------
01) --> Sprint==> Run(1)
01) --> Brawl==> Dmg(1)
01) --> Supremacy==> Empty(1)
02) --> Rest==> Heal(2)
---------------------------------------------

114k on an AV (Black Swan), with a lvl 47 troller. Double xp weekend.