Talen Lee

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You write as if Tankers are somehow in need of buffing for buffing's sake. I stopped reading at that point.

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compared to brutes,

[/ QUOTE ]They're not brutes. They're tankers.

You write as if Tankers are somehow in need of buffing for buffing's sake. I stopped reading at that point.

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I'd like to see a Task Force...no, a Strike Force that revolves around the Warriors and ends with a fight with Odysseus. I only say that it should be a Strike Force because it could fill one of the holes in the villain Strike Force chain...Not sure if they spawn high or low enough for either hole, though...Hrm...

[/ QUOTE ]While I'm at it, I want a 10-15 strike force where you raid the goldbrickers' chocolate factory. Or make it a trial, one huge chocolate factory map.

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There's been discussions that brutes will wipe tanks out of the game, but I don't see it happening.

[/ QUOTE ]Pretty much. The people who say such things are the kind of people who wouldn't ever play tanks anyway. I know I vastly prefer tanks to brutes the more I play my brutes.

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Arguing with J_B is like arguing with a conspiracy theorist.

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Arguing with J_B is arguing with a conspiracy theorist.

[/ QUOTE ]I wouldn't go that far. Conspiracy theorists dedicate their effort to dealing with information-bound conspiracies that affect things that actually matter*. They don't sit in the restauraunt and continue eating while whining about the quality of the food and asking for a second serve.

* Or would, if they existed.

Arguing with J_B is like arguing with a conspiracy theorist. Any evidence at all, even that which directly contradicts his point, is held as evidence for it. While I understand that there's a necessity to opposing intellectually worthless ideas so as to prevent them from garnering traction amongst the innocent, I can't imagine it's worth the bother to try and be thorough.

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Both Energy and Icy get Power Boost, so I wouldn't be surprised...

[/ QUOTE ]Absolutely, and back when both sets were designed they had very different characters.

I doubt we'd get Build-Up proper. It would diminish the uniqueness of Elec.

That sounds to me Babs like you're conflating 'simple' and 'elegant.'

I'm serious, and making fun of my own history of not being excited.

This is my excited face.

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Looking forward to Thorntrops, but then I tend to like DoT slows (Rain of Fire, Freezing Rain).

[/ QUOTE ]There's an illustrious comparison that is also going to be somewhat disappointing.

Dude, having just spent a day buying full sets of IOs for 50s, I have to say: Sets are cheaper.

We might just not care.

In all seriousness, I don't know Ice/ from a hole in the ground. But +1 and hopefully bumping so other people pay attention who might know it.

You felt heroic engaging in a competitive sport of killing people without consequence?

Low standards, man.

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Do I lose much by fast-forwarding to later levels?

[/ QUOTE ]Nothing you can't flashback to and is really worth the effort to do so.

Fling Thorns -> Dark Obliteration is enough of an attack chain, in my experience.

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You Duelist and increase your maximum Endurance.
Shutting off Holiday Rocket Pack.
You are no longer flying.
Blood Brother Brawler HITS you! Revolver power had a 34.38%% chance to hit and rolled a 3.97.
You activated the Mind Probe power.
HIT Blood Brother Brawler! Your Mind Probe power had a 76.00%% chance to hit, you rolled a 20.29.
Blood Brother Brawler shoots you for 14.38 points of damage!
Your Mind Probe rips the mind of Blood Brother Brawler for 24.99 points of psionic damage and Slows their attack speed!
Blood Brother Brawler MISSES! Brawl power had a 55.00%% chance to hit, but rolled a 65.47.
Blood Brother Brawler MISSES! Brawl power had a 55.00%% chance to hit, but rolled a 94.33.
You activated the Ring of Fire power.
HIT Blood Brother Brawler! Your Ring of Fire power had a 91.20%% chance to hit, you rolled a 2.59.
Your Ring of Fire burns Blood Brother Brawler for 2.17 points of fire damage.
Blood Brother Brawler HITS you! Brawl power had a 55.00%% chance to hit and rolled a 20.89.
Your Ring of Fire burns Blood Brother Brawler for 2.17 points of fire damage.
Blood Brother Brawler hits you for 13.4 points of smashing damage!
Your Ring of Fire burns Blood Brother Brawler for 2.17 points of fire damage.
Mind Probe is recharged.
Ring of Fire is recharged.
Blood Brother Brawler HITS you! Brawl power had a 55.00%% chance to hit and rolled a 48.56.
Blood Brother Brawler hits you for 13.4 points of smashing damage!
Your Ring of Fire burns Blood Brother Brawler for 2.17 points of fire damage.
You activated the Mind Probe power.
HIT Blood Brother Brawler! Your Mind Probe power had a 76.00%% chance to hit, you rolled a 38.30.
Blood Brother Brawler HITS you! Brawl power had a 55.00%% chance to hit and rolled a 31.40.
Your Mind Probe rips the mind of Blood Brother Brawler for 24.99 points of psionic damage and Slows their attack speed!
Your Ring of Fire burns Blood Brother Brawler for 2.17 points of fire damage.
You gain 25 experience and 11 infamy.
Riot Gear gains 9 prestige.
You received Clockwork Winder.
Blood Brother Brawler hits you for 13.4 points of smashing damage!
Mind Probe is recharged.

[/ QUOTE ]Sample size of one attack on one fire/psi, but hey. *shrugs* Doesn't seem to be working for me.

Because then Nerva would have two giant monsters nobody notices or cares about.

Okay. So.

Getting through my mind/energy and my fire/fire's builds and getting to grips with what made them tick? Not so hard. I still want to change some things (like ditching Power Sink and maaaybe Consume on the fire/fire), I'm happy with how they work, and they feel very distinct. I put them as first priority because the fire/fire is still levelling up and the mind/energy had a truly ridiculous amount of global recharge, so I was curious as to how the changes were going to work out.

Setting those two aside, this leaves me with my first 50, my first permadom, and the whole reason I stuck out six months on Virtue and became so solidified there. Battlebriar. He went through about... six builds, and has changed a lot over time, and this big change has made me re-evaluate everything I could. I just used his second build to spec into a SO-only powerset; he has every power in his primary except Entangle, Spore Burst and Spirit Tree, with everything in the secondary (heck, you could just look at the build here). This was so I could see what things were like, and avoid falling into the familiar pattern I had before - ie, never touch impale, it's [censored].

I then went out and did some Borea missions and tried out a few combat styles. What I have learned, and I really do want to hear what people think and how they've experienced differently. Or even numbers. Numbers are good. I'm formulating a plan of how I want to build his main build to hum, and this is what I'm finding:

The Good:
Impale and Thorn Barrage now have a bit more kick to them, as does Thorny Darts. If someone was to play a /thorn dom who eschewed the melee powers, Skewer and Ripper and Thorn Burst, they're probably going to do fine, especially since Barrage and Impale happen to both keep opponents at distances.

The Bad:
Despite the change to the ranged powers, I still don't see myself giving up melee. Ripper does about a quarter more damage than Thorn Barrage, and about a third more than Impale, and it's an area damage power. The melee stuff is just so good by comparison. If I was playing a more active primary - something like Mind or Gravity, where I need to be constantly swapping between primary and secondary modes, I could understand wanting to keep range more - indeed, or just plain preferring flight.

The Ugly:
Thorn Burst still feels like it's not worth it. Even with Soul Drain, I hate this power. The 3-second cast time just doesn't feel like it has the same kick as other PBAOEs - I even prefer combustion to this power. Thorntrops breaks flow, so unless I'm fighting an AV (and hey, I figure it's only a matter of time before we see AV-soloing dom threads that don't take eighty [censored] minutes), I don't see myself ever throwing it out there, meaning its (comparatively) high damage is pretty meaningless. I don't need the control its slow provides.

Which means, overall... Thorn Barrage and Impale are better, Thorntrops and Thorn Burst are still bad, and Thorny Darts does pretty much nothing for me. I'm exactly where I started, but at the same time, I feel like there are more options. I definitely hit harder - bosses are not an issue of whittling, and I take them at a similar pace to my other characters.

Pretty happy with the changes, but I was hoping to be pleasantly surprised by one of the ranged attacks.

Tank - Easier to soft cap, less need to, great on a team, gets Shield Charge at 26.

Scrapper - Expensive to soft cap, brilliant solo, gets Shield Charge at 35.

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In my experience, the last four powers in Dark Armor are easily postponable, and likely skippable in favour of relatively early Fighting pool for Tough.

[/ QUOTE ]... On Dark Armour?

Seriously?

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I would do Ice/ - unless you don't want to take PSW which pretty much invalidates the point of sleeping mobs with Mind/.

[/ QUOTE ]Pish tosh. Mind has more strings to its bow than just Mass Hypnosis. It's just that mass Hyp is so effing brilliant in the thirty levels you have access to it, and don't have access to PSW.

Da's toggles are in no way more or less expensive than comparative alternative toggles. The real end hog is Dark Regen. Frankenslot it, or, failing that, slot your attacks for end reduction. You don't really need recharge in Dark Regen and you barely need any accuracy or heal.

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Being fair, he might find endurance costs more prevalent because he's killing faster.

[/ QUOTE ]Actually that would make it seem less because you kill more stuff between the time you rest or use domination.

[/ QUOTE ]Eh, I haven't found the experience of which I speak - but I hear it a common complaint about Stone Melee.