Xanthus_EU

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dramatically lower the stalkers damage to around 21.3% of what it is originally.

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No resistance works against critical hits. AS is a critical hit.. 100% damage from stalkers cant be resisted.

Xanthus; where did you get that value from?

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Hero builder; Says that granite on tanks gives 78.7% resistance to everything but psi with 3 resistance SOs (+3) in it.

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2 blasters run up to a stone-brute in granite.
2 stalkers run up to a stone-tank in granite.

Who dies first, Jack?

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Shall we do numbers (kinda)? I'll write the long answer first. Skip to the bottom line if you can't be bothered to read all about numbers and tactics.

We'll assume that this is in Warburg, and that both of the stalkers have taken their "Elude" type toggles with 3 slots for defence in each. A */SR stalker (don't know the numbers for the others) with the AoE defence toggle running AND elude comes out with around 105% defence to AoEs. If both stalkers click these, mudpots has a 5% chance to hit them which really isn't very much. AS'ing through Mudpots is not hard at all. However, Granite armour does dramatically lower the stalkers damage to around 21.3% of what it is originally. Tanks have obscenely high HP anyway, and if he's clicked Earth's Embrance he's got 80% higher on top. Factoring this in, I'd say that the tank would very slowly squish the stalkers, assuming that the stalkers don't run away after they see the pathetic amount of damage their AS has done.

Now we'll look at the blasters. Assuming they're going to stick mostly to range and kiting by jumping over the mudpots (as I'd expect any good PvP blaster to do), mudpots isn't really a factor like with the stalkers. Due to the obscene resistence (though not as high as the tanks) provided by granite, the blasters overall DPS will be lowered but will still be higher than the stalkers (as stalker damage sucks when not hidden, imo). Since Granite slows movement a whole lot, and assuming that the blasters keep moving like I said earlier, I'd expect the brute to have a lot of trouble landing a hit on either of the blasters.

The short answer is this: The brute dies first.

Didn't Hamidon used to be a man? He took some kind of drug and turned into the big jelly-blob we see in the hive. Maybe there's some way to reverse the process by defeating GMs? But then why would Hami drop Hami-O's after a hold-based defeat?

Another thing to take into account; there are lots of Devouring Earth GMs organized into sort of ranks or lines, perhaps protecting something? Why?

I'd be inclined to take it. I have a fire/TA and it's pretty end heavy so I'm definitely getting it on mine.

I don't think hasten is needed though. You have two single target holds already, so you can probably stack holds faster than a controller with hasten but only one single target hold.

If you're PvEing with not a huge view to doing any PvP, take Fire for damage. You get two blasts and a nice shield as well but they're a little too end heavy to be using a lot in PvP. Mass Hypnosis + Fireball will get you a LOT of damage out in 2 moves. Just make sure you team with a good tanker!

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[..]Would the perception bonus be high enough to see stalkers with both hide+stealth running? How about players with invis?[..]


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Hide and stealth makes you harder to see than just invis, and tactics can see through invis no problem.

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There's no use arguing about any of this, of course, Developers have said that stacking Stealth and Hide to counter stacked +perception is not intended, and that they're going to stop players from being able to be one-shotted.

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They have? I'm sure it says in Hides description that it can be stacked with other stealth powers to make the stalker harder to see!

I know one-shotting is being looked at, but you're a bad PvP stalker if you aren't prepared for an instance where you don't one shot someone.

I've said it once and I'll say it again: Stalkers have one trick, and one trick only. You take away their ability to be the assassin class (which is what they're SUPPOSED to be) and you may as well remove the whole AT from the game.

Besides that, half the fun of PvP is working out a way to beat someone that appears to be "unbeatable". I certainly wouldn't still be playing if I knew that I could march into a PvP zone, steamroller everyone and then leave. How can you improve without failing?

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I see what you are saying, but in all honesty, I've had my butt handed to me by a stalker who missed his AS. Mostly because his defense was incredible.(Yes, this has only happened ONCE in well over 10 hours in Sirens, because EVERY OTHER stalker that misses me with their AS runs away promptly afterwards) And insane defense is something they also have going for them. What blasters have is slightly higher damage for bread'n'butter attacks, but not so much that it's their obvious advantage. Stalkers obvious advantages is the ability to stack Hide with Stealth, their INSANE assassin strike AND very very high defense.


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You're kidding, right? You do know the highest defence value on ANY stalker toggle is the 55% (iirc) AoE defence that SR stalkers get with Evade, and that's not even avaliable in sirens. Stalker defence with three +3 SO's in it hits around 25-30%. What you were probably fighting was a stalker who had exploited the fact that it's possible to click Kuji-In Reitsu, Elude or Overload before you enter the zone and keep the defence values once they get in. While that needs to be fixed, the defence values DEFINITELY aren't high (with the exception of the powers I stated earlier, but they're all clicks and last for about a minute each with a recharge of about 5).

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If I'd have any say in this matter, I'd leave their defense as it is, AS as it is, and add a parameter to hide that made it either impossible to use stealth with hide, or something they had to sacrifice to be able to use them both together. I have used 2 pool power sets just to be able to protect myself somewhat against stalkers and still it's not enough -by far-. Stalkers can (almost) NEVER have a fair fight, because against 90% of the hero population, they have an unfair advantage that it's impossible for us to overcome.

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1. Stealth and hide isn't overpowered, and it's counterable.
2. Your idea of a "fair fight" is a stalkers idea of a nightmare. Once they've AS'd, thats it. They really are one trick ponies and nothing more.
3. Which two power pool sets did you pick up? My ice/nrg blaster friend has no +perception powers, yet he has absolutely no trouble with stalkers. On the same point, nor do I and I play the squishiest AT in the game!

You'd need more phases, as hami spawns MORE mitos at 25%, 15%, 10% AND 5% health.

If you're looking to PvP I'd definitely take dark. AR has huge animation times, does smash/lethal damage and most of the damage it does deal is DoT, which isn't that hot for PvP.

What he said.

Another example is this: I have what you would call a "Finely tuned PvP build" (or so I'd like to think). However, if I was to put my brother behind the controls of my character, he'd die. A whole lot.

Besides that, part of the skill IS being able to come up with new tactics and superior builds. Although it's not all about the numbers, they do help (as they do in PvE as well).

You're missing Taunt. Get that in ASAP.

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Ah but the arena is so [censored], under-used and impossible to find an opponent you can't really blame people for having 1 v 1 in PvP zones.

Just because you can do something, does't mean it's acceptable.

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Actually, there was this thing a while back you might have heard of. It was called S4, and there were a whole LOAD of entrants. We also used to have PvP fights of maybe 10-14 people in the arena on most nights of the week, but now that the PvP zones have come in people are using the arena a lot less.

The arena isn't [censored], imo. It requires a lot more skill to win a fight in the arena than in an open PvP zone, because there are a lot more things you have to factor in when you fight in the arena. If you need an opponent, you just have to ask. If all else fails, you could always ask over SG chat and I'm sure one of us will oblige

In a PvP zone, everything is open. Every villain is avaliable to be attacked, and to attack. If it's within the games mechanics, and I'm not exploiting anything, then its acceptable in my opinion. Besides that, it takes all of maybe 2 minutes to send a tell to someone to ask if they want an arena duel, set one up, send them an arena invite (syntax is /ai <playername> in case you didn't know) and then start the match. Nobody can interrupt you in the arena, so you don't have anything to complain about.

I think the values for AM are lower than SB. The difference is that AM is that it's PbAoE (and you can apply it to yourself) whereas SB is single target (and you can't).

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EDIT: Oh, and don't ever give anyone the '1 V 1 IS FOR THE ARENA' [censored]. SHAMELESS PLUG!

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Actually, the arena IS for 1vs1s. It's meant to be there as a controlled PvP environment rather than free-form like the zones are. If I kill you when you're having a "private" 1vs1 in a PvP zone, you'll get the same reply from me every time.

My stalker isn't nin/nin, but I think if you're making a pure PvP build I'd be inclined to actually take less of your actual powersets and more power pools. For example, I'd actually consider not taking Danger Sense and Ninja Reflexes at all since you're going to die once you're spotted anyway, and Ninjitsu has the lowest defence values in the game. I'd still take caltrops because it's good to stop people running away once you've ASd them. Obviously mez protection is a must, and I'd probably grab the heal as well. Smoke bomb isn't actually that good in PvP so I'd take Placate over that.

In terms of attacks, again I'd consider being weird and not actually taking that many. I'm not entirely sure about the ninja blade set, but I know that my spines/ stalker is only going to have AS, impale, throw spines and probably one more.
For power pools, Concealment is a must so you can stack hide with stealth. I'd probably grab Teleport as my main travel power since it's completely unsupressed and it'll also allow you to get TP foe for tp foe -> placate -> caltrops -> AS combos. If I had room in my build, I'd probably consider taking the presence pool as well since Intimidate might be good for keeping squishies rooted to the spot.

In PvP, if I was playing with your character, I'd run in and drop caltrops on them, then placate, then build up and AS followed by a few other attacks if they weren't one-shotted by AS.

Don't care. If your name is orange, then you die. Unless, of course, it's orange because you're already dead. Then it'd be pretty damn stupid to try and attack you.

LOVE - the fact that everyone else hates my AT

HATE - Fighting tanks. Since I'm a /emp I have no debuffs and I can't seem to knock their toggles off with holds fast enough to make them go through an entire tray of BFs in one fight.

The only things I can see are that I'd probably take swift/hurdle over hurdle/health and I'd probably 6 slot aim/BU with 3 recharge and 3 tohits.

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The raid failed
And then the zone crashed


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I don't think it actually failed, it was so early on that it wouldn't have been too hard to start again from the beggining (and the hami tank was still alive iirc)

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I think Psi is still the best, ok Indom Will is no longer perma (RIP ) but you can get Psi damage for Containment which isn't widely resisted, Mez resist every now and again and of course a shield which covers Smash/Lethal as well as Psi.

The other pools don't really compare, Power comes close with Power Boost but you're probably planning PvP at 40+ so you'll be Arena-ing no? Psi is better cause you die less with it, Power Boost might help you get a kill every now and again.

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I disagree. I think the epic depends on what powersets you have in the first place. As a /empathy, the primal forces pool is much more viable to me because Powerboost basically makes me invincible (powerboost -> RA -> Regen Aura), while power blast is a nice attack to use while I wait for my hold to recharge.

For my mind/storm I'll probably go primal as well, because the whole build is extremely endurance heavy and conserve power will help me combat this. It'd be either that or fire, but fireball costs a little bit too much endurance to be particularly viable in PvP, imo.

Wow, that's a lot of the same post.

Mesmerize - Dominate - Levitate is your best attack chain. If you're going with PvP, slot dominate 2 acc, 1hld, 2 dam, 1 rchg. Honestly, I'm suprised you didn't six slot it anyway.

Mesmerize should be acc acc dam dam dam endrdx
Levitate should be acc acc dam dam dam rech
Dominate should be acc acc dam dam dam hlddur

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Once my Break Frees were used up I was terrorised almost all the time.

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That's Dead Calm. He told us he would at the start of the match, too!

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Also I was taunted just when I was close to defeating anyone .

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Generalissimo was that one. We put him on defending the squishies and he did a great job.

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If I rememeber correctly Union had 1 controller, 1 tank, rest were scrappers and blasters. Defiant had a slightly better balance of AT's.

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You guys had at least 2 tanks, but you had an absolute crapload of scrappers and blasters. One spines guy wouldn't leave me alone, and Disco King seemed to have it in for me as well. Thankfully, we'd thought ahead and Imaginary was packing Fallout for all the times I died.

I think my favorite part of the match was watching Disco King run towards me popping Aim+Build up, only to have me Dimension Shift him and see the word "Unaffected!" float above my head.