Aett_Thorn

The hotfix that they had to put in might have affected more than it was supposed to. At the same time, if the exploiters weren't being exploiters, it wouldn't have needed a hotfix.

I imagine that that would be as useful as the Windows Office paperclip assistant thingy. You know, the one that made me want to destroy all paperclips.

Team balance does come into effect at some point. However, the devs have stated that the expect any powerset combination to be able to go through missions solo on the lowest difficulty setting in a reasonable amount of time. That does NOT mean that they expect every power to be useful for that purpose, only that characters should be able to do it (and yes, you can gimp a character so that they can't do that, but that takes some work).

However, that does mean that Defenders were working fine, based on that definition, even before I17. Were they as effective as other ATs? No, they weren't. However, they could do it, and that was okay at the time. Added to that, given the fact that the devs need to balance across ATs, and not overpower Defenders in the process of buffing them, it can be tough to come up with a solution that gets you the right results in terms of powerlevel across the AT, especially considering the wide variety of powersets that Defenders get. A Rad/Sonic Defender was likely soloing at speeds a FF/Elec Defender could only dream of. So it does get a little complicated.


However, the devs do design the game so that the sets are balanced around solo play, keeping in mind teaming at the same time. Solo at 1/+0 is the minimum baseline that they balance around. A full team running at +4 is likely their top limit of balancing.

And I really am fine with that. I take exception when people come here and say things like "I think this set should be fixed, but have no clue how to do it." At that point, the post is fairly meaningless.

I think that the Fix TA thread was a great one. It offered a lot of good fix ideas, and started off with a big list of potential fixes that people could then discuss.

But coming out and pretty much saying that you don't care to do the actual work, just whine about how the set is currently doesn't get anyone anywhere. Take some time and actually come up with some kind of solution to the problem.


I mean, if Rabid had come here and said something like this about EM:

I have two problems with EM: 1) the recent nerf to ET has slowed down the set too much, and 2) you don't see EM enough in PUGs. I think that you can fix this by speeding up some of the animations, even if you have to leave ET as is. I think that this would fix the second problem as well.


Then I would have had no problems with it at all. None. Zero. Nada. It's the attitude of coming here, presenting a problem, and then offering no solutions that bothers me.


Do I think that EM could use some fixes? Yes. Do I think that ET's animation is too long, especially given the rest of the set? Yes. Do I think that the AoE damage and AoE mitigation of the set is way too low in the set's current implementation? Yes. But if I was to come and create a thread on it, I wouldn't just leave it at that. I would suggest improvements to it, like:

1) Speed up the TF animation, so that there aren't two really long animating powers in the set.

2) Increase the damage and radius of Whirling Hands. That would help with both the mitigation and damage in the AoE department.

Otherwise, it really is just saying something akin to: "The government sucks!' "Well, do you know how to fix it?" "No, I just wanted to complain about it."

Except, that you still admitted that you weren't posting this to be constructive. Just saying that something should be changed is fairly useless. It's exactly like saying something like this:

"I think my car is broken. I don't care to fix it, but I just wanted you to know."

To which the only response can be: "Well, okay then."

As such, the point of your OP was just to rant. Granted, you're kindly allowing us to use your thread to point out suggestions (how nice of you), but the point of your original post was NOT to do that. Hence why your OP is useless, not this thread. Especially given the much longer thread on TA that happened very recently here, and offered a lot of good suggestions on that, and that you seem to admit that there are lots of EM threads out there, any one of which you could have posted this in, if they are as rampant as you say.


Edit -> I'd also like to bring this up:

These are your reasons that you put forth for WHY the set needs to be changed. You've got your first point, about the cottage rule, which isn't even accurate. It didn't completely change how the set works, just slowed it down a bit (perhaps a bit too much). Then you point out that the rarity of the set as you see it is a reason for why it should be changed. As such, you provide no facts. You provide a spurious argument, that ends up not even being an argument for it at all, and then bring up what's basically an opinion and attribute your own reason to it and present that as a fact.

"I don't see it in PUGs, therefore the set must be broken" is bad logic. It might be the case, but isn't necessarily true. Attributing that argument as fact seems much more like a rant to me than anything else.

I actually figured that Dechs knew what I was saying. I just wanted OTHER people to know that. My apologies if it came across as me not thinking that Dechs knew that.

Still, Rabib, you want to put some examples forth of where I've done what you stated I do, without apologizing for it?

Well, not really, since it's only looking at ST damage output. For instance, if your statement were true, then Spines would need a lot more buffing than EM would. However, Spines has a lot of AoE damage, and so could be just fine. Dark Melee also has a lot of tricks, and so would be higher on the "useful" sets list than something like Fire Melee, even though Fire Melee is higher than it.


The chart does a great job at showing the ST damage of the various sets, but a lot more needs to be looked at than it for determining what needs buffed and what doesn't.

If this is true, then this is a pointless thread, and should be locked. You've just admitted that you don't want it to be about discussing changes, just ranting.

Except, again, this means adding effects to the powers so that they all have two secondary effects. And if you do that, you either increase player power, or you have to take something from another area of the power (decrease damage, increase endurance cost, decrease the other effects, etc) to maintain the current balance level.


I'd much rather have more sets made for the current areas to increase flexibility than have to jury-rig a system together to add effects to powers that don't make sense.


Edit -> And, again, I don't think that the newer sets are any better at doing this than the older sets. Most of the Broadsword and Katana powers, for instance, can take Melee, Defense Debuff, and Accurate Defense Debuff. So that is three sets per power.

Meanwhile, Scrapper Fire Melee (a newer set for them) can only take Melee sets. Electrical Melee can take Melee, Sleeps, and EndMods. Some of the Dual Blade attacks (arguably the 'newest' set for Scrappers) can only take Melee sets as well, though some can take a few secondary sets as well.


And even after ALL of that, you're not going to see much variety in the builds still, since slotting for a number of secondary effects and their sets means that you don't slot as much for damage and Acc, so you end up with a worse power. Slotting would likely stay the same, with only a single IO difference depending on taste, since you'd want to get a decent amount of Acc, Damage, EndRed, and RecRed on the powers.

I don't.


2 > 0. And those powers can be useful when dealing with a boss, to keep him at range.

This would only work if the powersets that you think need looking at were somehow buffed, while the other sets got nothing. If the powersets are in balance now, then a buff would throw them off.

Which powersets do you think need these buffs?

Taking down the minions in a spawn would be fine. Taking down the boss at the end would be endurance hell.

Ummm...you know that the main difference between the two is the name of the set, right? And the fact that Ninja blade gets Assassin strike because it's a Stalker set?