Augury

Atlas will turn over in his grave at the suggestion that he was a supervillain simply for supering without a license.

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I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that he is technically not 'evil', in the normal meaning of the word.

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I hate to bring semantics into this but:

e·vil Audio pronunciation of "evil" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (vl)
adj. e·vil·er, e·vil·est

1. Morally bad or wrong; wicked: an evil tyrant.
2. Causing ruin, injury, or pain; harmful: the evil effects of a poor diet.
3. Characterized by or indicating future misfortune; ominous: evil omens.
4. Bad or blameworthy by report; infamous: an evil reputation.
5. Characterized by anger or spite; malicious: an evil temper.

It fits 1, 2, 4 and arguably 5 of those definitions, by the normal meaning of the word.

EDIT: Furthermore before it gets brought up, while you can argue that morals are relative (and they are not in Co*) ethicality is not, and is a clearly defined standard of "good" morality. You can twist what Doc V does to be moral by relative morality, but you can't twist it so it's ethical, thus it's still quite evil as per the only objective measure of such things.

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Dr. Vahz is NOT evil, he is just misunderstood in his attempts to bring immortality to mankind, as I noted in one of my previous posts.

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I think your moral and ethical compass needs finetuning if you seriously believe that. He's stealing people's wives, husbands, children and loved ones off the street to kill them and harvest their organs to create patchwork zombies. Sorry, yes that is evil, because it is unethical, because the end does not warrant the means.

[/ QUOTE ]Unethical? Yes, of course it is, but the thing is, his intentions are good, he's just so insane that he doesnt care about ethics, in his mind those people must be sacrificed for the greater good.

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Obviously megalomania and god complexes are now an excuse for genocide. I'm sure that makes the turks who comitted genocide against the armenians in WW1 not evil either. Just misunderstood.

EDIT: That comparison might've been tasteless

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Dr. Vahz is NOT evil, he is just misunderstood in his attempts to bring immortality to mankind, as I noted in one of my previous posts.

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I think your moral and ethical compass needs finetuning if you seriously believe that. He's stealing people's wives, husbands, children and loved ones off the street to kill them and harvest their organs to create patchwork zombies. Sorry, yes that is evil, because it is unethical, because the end does not warrant the means.

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The Doc in Cap studies people she infects herself, without the person knowing (King Midas).

[/ QUOTE ]She didn't infect midas herself, she just didnt want to tell him his condition

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The clue specifies something along the lines of "Oddly Midas only started to exhibit symptoms the day after you stole the lab equipment from Arachnos", I just finished the arc today, yes she infected him, she also lied to you about it all, she just wanted to infect then cure King Midas so he would owe her.

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Doc.Creed is an absolute psycho who dissects the bodies of Heroes so he can replicate their powers in his experiments.

[/ QUOTE ]But he does it only to advance science, not because he's evil

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So Doc Vahz isn't evil then? He's only doing it for science too. Oh wait, archvillain, I guess that excuse isn't good enough huh? That and Creed wants you to kill a hero. Is that for science too then and not evil?

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Saving St.Martial from attacks isn't altruistic in nature; it's an understandable reaction to an invasion force.

[/ QUOTE ]Many of hard case's missions are about helping civilians against wailers, which is not 'evil' IMO.

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Civilians are the lifeblood of the Rogue Isles, if people were to indiscriminately start killing off the population all villains lose out on their main source of power: the sheep wandering around the rogue isles. RIP officers are corrupt but they still protect people, this doesn't make them less evil, just not stupid. A ton of the criminal organizations aren't out there to wantonly hurt "the little guys", and those that are are not tolerated by the other criminal groups. Arachnos for instance deals with the snakes, as do RIPs, mercs, etc. Arachnos and just about EVERY other criminal group despises the Vahzilok because they target people off the street for "harvesting", and from watching NPCs, I can tell you many criminals find them despicable and will kill them on sight. This does not make said criminals less evil, just not dumb as a horse's backside.

Next you'll tell me Ghost Widow isn't evil despite overhearing the family say that she ripped a poor bastards heart out of his chest, killing him instantly before the medical transporter could grab him because he refused to do as he was told, because she does work for Arachnos that involves dealing with obvious threats to the civilian population, the civilian population which are the consumers of the rogue isles, consumerism is how money exists, money is power, villains don't want to lose power. Only stupid villains would condone randomly targetting civilians. It's business, not wholesale slaughterfests.

I've found sing is best utilized in two fashions (other than just letting it do its thing) and neither of these require any particular slotting (for me its two hold, two acc, two dam):

1. Locking down bosses/elite bosses/AVs. If you can get your singularity to target what you want it to, then between you, your sing, domination and/or certain buffs you CAN permahold an AV. I've done it. It is possible, if not a bit tricky. I've noticed the singularity will generally attack whichever is closest to it and stick, it also seems to target switch depending on amount of aggro. If you cant get it to target the boss/EB/AV by simply moving forward, try summoning it on or near said mob so it'll most likely get the aggro.

2. Tanking! Okay so this is not the most efficient way to use your sing but if your power is already recharged this can actually help to take the alpha from big groups when nobody else can. Simply summon your sing in the middle of the group of mobs, and watch them fly. The damn thing can take a beating and will draw aggro from that repel, and your teammates can mop up more safely. It even survives about half the time I do this for me.

City of Villains is more like Organized Crime than it is flat out villainy. If you want to play a crazed psycho murderer who goes on killing sprees against civilians all the time, that won't fly. In fact, you'll probably become such a liability the arbiters will rule that you should be found out and terminated for the good of the Rouge Isles.

Just because you're a villain doesn't mean you have to be self destructive.

If you want to play an anti-hero, why not just feel free to do so instead of saying CoV isn't suited for real villainy, and then persisting that in the face of evidence to the contrary?

... I dunno, just a thought I had.

I assume only bonesmasher/whirling hands/total focus drop toggles, and the ranged attacks don't?

Odd that, but good to know.

What people are trying to point out is that I think the OP wanted to know if energy attacks have toggledrop independantly of any stun they may or may not have.

TF toggledrops because its almost a sure stun.

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Hi, i am new to this game, i have been trying out a few different chars, got a dom to 9 and i am enjoying it, but from some posts here it sounds like the dominator is underpowered? is it worth keeping my dominator and making it my main, or should i just give up on it and train up a MM or Cor or something? (Btw its plant/thorns)

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At the risk of sounding like a stuck up elitist fangirl: people who say dominators are underpowered either aren't playing their dominator right, or are teaming with dominators who aren't playing their character right.

Not too odd considering so many still like to throw that whole "dominators are controllers" thing around.

Though I will admit some types of dominators bloom late and some combinations of sets are weaker than others. Plants is a -very- good set, I can't make a call on thorns but I've seen it dish out damage-a-plenty.

So to simply answer your question: dominators are not underpowered.

Hold the biggest, meaniest, nastiest, most threatening thing I can see and go to town on it.

If a corruptor is AoEing for damage I'll drop a few crushing fields in there too, especially if I have rage inspirations.

If they're up, power boost, gravity distortion field, and the fight will mostly be over. Especially since when I hit dom and drop GDF the corruptors and everyone else knows to go nuts on AoE damage so yanno... they don't last long.

Depends on what you wanna do.

If you wanna solo a lot I can recommend grav/enr (pick up propel) because it's the most blasty combo I've had so far. Singularity will make your soloing life soooo much easier too. It's like having a pet grav controller in your pocket. Warn you though, this can feel a bit control light compared to other sets.

If you wanna team a lot a plants dominator will do -very- well, then it's up to you what to do with your secondary. Personally I like ice on the side for the slow. Also has powerboost like energy, that's a big plus.

If you're using propel, or possibly lift (I don't have it on my current grav/enr) you might want to pick up stamina. I personally got it at 28 and haven't regretted it, but is it vital? Ehhh... probably not really. I'd say it's up to personal preference.

The monkey fight club and the golden giza wouldn't have these problems: you never have to go there, gameplay wise. Doubt most people even know where the monkey fight club is or hell, that it even exists.

Plus, it has monkey fights?

What I meant was that while most ATs have different sets of powersets that work in different ways, MMs have a lot of very stapleish powers. I mean, is any MM really going to mess up their build by skipping their summon powers? Stuff like that. I had to think very hard on my grav/enr dominator because I had far fewer staple powers that I knew I HAD to get or I was being a silly, silly person. It can get worse still when you're playing things like heavily tricked out plants dominators built purely for control, or optimum builds for stalkers and corruptors to get the most out of anything.

Not to say that MMs don't require any thought, but it's relatively sure you're not gonna miss the core essence powers that drives your AT.

As far as I'm concerned masterminds are strong in PVE but by no means overpowered. Depending on the sets they have some tricks up their sleeves, but nothing like corruptors or dominators. They can do damage, but nothing like brutes, stalkers, corruptors and even some properly executed dominators (especially with domination).

Hell, the main thing MMs seem to do is tank. Not quite tanking, but from teaming with Eressos' MM she seems to "diffuse aggro". By no means are MMs tanks, though they certainly make things easier. MMs can't hold aggro from PCs though most of the time, and MMs have a tendency for sudden faceplant syndrome in cases.

I'd say an MM needn't be all that much better than other ATs in PVE. They're different, but if you see a well built plants dominator doing their thing or a rad/dark corruptor: I certainly can't say any of these are inherently more powerful than the other.

I'll give you that MMs have a much easier time soloing than some other ATs.

EDIT: But hey, maybe everyone I regularly team with takes their jobs so very seriously and has honed their skills so much that we can actually compete with the fabled MM. And while I would like to flatter myself and my friends like that, I hardly think we're THAT godly uber.

Hell, I'll go one better: I regularly team with TWO MMs. I'm a level 33 grav/enr dominator. I feel in no way shape or form outmoded even when both are doing their thing. I can tell neither do our corruptors. We rarely team with stalkers and brutes, and perhaps they'd feel less useful, but in my eyes brutes are very team unfriendly to start with (and the fury mechanism is antithesis to what brute conceptually are if you ask me) and stalkers... well, let's just say I've never seen an MM down a boss in 2 seconds flat.

EDIT2: I don't know where people are getting the fact from that MMs are easy and safe to play either. Especially in teams things can and will sneak up and hammer the MM, they can be unexpectedly one shotted and BOOM, it's all over. A good MM will be doing lots of things, as well as the difficult task of micromanaging their minions.

If an MM is standing back in a team doing nothing, then they're a bad MM and probably will cause their team to faceplant. Sure it's easy for them and they're relatively safe, but if I stay in the back with my dominator and only use power blast and power bolt I'm safe too, I'm far less effective same as the MM that does this. Same goes for any AT. If you think an MM who stands back and lazes about is even nearly as effective as an active MM, you're dead wrong.

The main thing I can see MMs being easier in is that you have to give little to no real thought about your build, what sets go best together, and what powers to pick in conjunction to get the most out of your AT. Other ATs tend to have to think more about this, if you ask me. But anyone who plays their AT smartly will be just as useful as a smart MM.

Those are my five cents. I don't want to see MMs nerfed, because I enjoy playing with them as equals. Not dragging them along as gutted fish because other ATs couldn't bother to put their back into keeping up with MMs that put their back into what they do.

I prefer the thought of an indoors meeting place over outdoors. I mean, how often do you just loiter in the streets waiting for someone to hang out with and talk to? >_>

Well I've definately not noticed it doing that, if that helps.

I don't think they exist, but I haven't been looking. I have most of the powers in my secondary. Now I'm curious if I've been toggledropping things without knowing.

Not sure what you're referring to, but I'm pretty sure that the disorient effect makes toggles drop when it gets through, yes.

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You're an utter nerd, sweety.

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But one with a very well thought out build.

The pet sounded kinda like a thorns scrapper to me, I'll reslot it differently if it turns out to be drastically different.

I'll look for the net gain of slotting duration over recharge, but I don't think I'll change my stance on this one. Durations rarely go over 30 seconds, while have a 240 second recharge is very common. If you slot 3 durations on vines then you get a 57 second hold every 240 seconds. Slot 3 recharges and you get a 30 second hold every roughly 2 minutes.

This is basically the same: 0.25 seconds per second will be your vines hold. So statistically one choice isn't any more inherently valuable the other. With power boost and hasten these figures would be: (if I recall my % stacking rules properly)

90 seconds hold per 140 seconds, or 60 seconds hold per 90 seconds. 0.64 and 0.66 seconds of hold per second. Respectively. Again, the difference is negligable.

You're right that slotting duration means less activations of the powers, and since I'm running a build sans stamina that means I take a double whammy, or I'm at least using more stamina than I could be. While completely a valid point, here's what I have to say about this:

Endurance drain is in your attack chains and regularly used powers with a low recharge rate!

Let's compare something as teeny as Ice Bolt to Vines, even on my 3 recharge way:

Ice Bolt:<ul type="square">[*]Costs 5.20 endurance[*]Recharge 4.00 seconds[/list]Vines:<ul type="square">[*]Costs 15.60 endurance[*]Recharge 90.00 seconds[/list]
This comes out at 1.3 endurance per second for Ice Bolt, and a tiny 0.1733 endurance per second for Vines. Sure, Vines takes a chunk out of my endurance all at once but it can't eat it up, it's endurance/second rating is far, far too low to ever run me out of endurance. Inversely if I keep ice bolt on auto attack that will run me out of endurance 7.5 times faster!

Now, since obviously large recharge powers aren't going to be the things to run me out of endurance (ice bolt, bitter ice blast, aid other and aid self are far, FAR more likely to do that) and I've already proved that the net gain between holds and recharges is just as much, the only remaining choice is: do I want my power to last longer and make some fights a lot easier, or do I want my power to be available more often and make almost all fights easier, though not as much as if it lasted longer?

You obviously subscribe to the former school of thought. This is fine, it's probably most effective in the really tough fights where mopping up quickly at the start before getting to the big fish (elite boss, AV, superhero) is important. However: I prefer my powers to be available to me on a regular basis. This far more dictates my personal preference than if it makes a medium difference vs a big difference. What good is a big difference if I can't apply it at least once a fight? With recharges, I'm almost -assured- it'll be available when I need it.

Seeds of confusion and Spore burst too would cost 0.5 endurance per second at worst in my build (if you don't look at the endurance redux I did put there for a reason), while ice bolt costs nearly 3 times as much and strangler costs 2 times as much. Note that ice bolt has an end redux in it to somewhat aleviate this problem which brings it down to less than 1 endurance per second, and that strangler DOES have 3 hold durations, because in that case it makes far, far more of a difference! It's already way end heavier than a lot of recharge heavy powers will ever be for me, slotting a lot of durations in it will let me pop it off a few times and then focus on other things, and I don't need recharges to be able to rely on it.

Now, as to why I don't need stamina, I simply compared to my grav/enr dom's regularly used powers she has at 32 with fully slotted stamina: (e/s = endurance per second)
- Power bolt: 1.3 e/s
- Gravity distortion: 1.07 e/s
- Bone smasher: 1.07 e/s
- Propel: 1.17 e/s
- Total Focus: 0.93 e/s
- Gravity distortion field: 0.11 e/s
- Dimension shift: 0.14 e/s
- Power boost: 0.09 e/s
- Toggle: Combat Jumping: 0.07 e/s
- Toggle: Maneuvers: 0.24 e/s

She goes through 6.19 endurance per second. This is of course overly optimistic but since I'll be taking the optimistic route for both, still valid as a comparative tool.

My planttroller:
- Hasten: 0.09 e/s

Hasted:
- Strangler: 1.81 e/s
- Ice bolt: 1.65 e/s
- Bitter ice blast: 1.38 e/s
- Aid other: 1.32 e/s
- Aid self: 1.32 e/s
- Power boost: 0.13 e/s
- Seeds of confusion: 0.40 e/s
- Spore burst: 0.37 e/s
- Vines: 0.17 e/s
- Carrion creepers: 0.19 e/s
- Spirit tree: 0.17 e/s

Not hasted:
- Strangler: 1.06 e/s
- Ice bolt: 0.98 e/s
- Bitter ice blast: 0.81 e/s
- Aid other: 0.87 e/s
- Aid self: 0.87 e/s
- Power boost: 0.09 e/s
- Seeds of confusion: 0.26 e/s
- Spore burst: 0.22 e/s
- Vines: 0.13 e/s
- Carrion creepers: 0.14 e/s
- Spirit tree: 0.12 e/s

Hasten will be up approximately 63% of the time, and thus down 37% of the time. With hasten the endurance per second rate is 8.91, without it 5.55, this means that the average rate is .63*8.91 + 0.37*5.55 + 0.09 (for hasten itself) = 7.7568 or 7.93 with chilling embrace, or 8.21 with whirlwind. Running both won't happen: whirlwind has a larger area than chilling embrace and would make it moot.

Now, you might say 7.7 is WELL over the 6.19 my other dominator with stamina has, and you'd be entirely correct. However, this is absolute WORST case scenario. Realistically I will be only using 3 to 4 endurance per second, since the likelyhood of me spamming strangler, ice bolt, bitter ice blast, my self heal and my heal other all at once is very slim. This is assuming I will using my chain powers about as much as normal despite hasten, and using aid other only 50% of the time, and aid self only 25% of the time. 3.5 is a lot lower than 6, obviously. The same cannot be said about my grav/enr, when I play her her chain is usually going off all the time. There is a very real potential for me running myself out of endurance quickly in a pinch by spamming powers, so one could say it swings between 3 and 8. This bothers me not, and while stamina might help in a pinch, likely it'll be a do or die scenario and I can use rest after. I don't expect to use more than 3 or 4 most of the time.

And even then, the long recharge powers that are not part of my chain are only making up 1.34 endurance/second for this. That's next to nothing.

Although upon review of these numbers, I am inclined to put extra end reduxes in my main chain powers.

I'll have to look into that. I'm even less inclined to switch out chilling embrace for another regular attack as that will drain my endurance pool even faster (since as we saw above, its not big endurance chunkers with long recharge that kill endurance, its your regular attack chain).


EDIT: Upon review of the figures above I've actually worked out that I'll be slotting my main chain powers as such:

Strangler: Acc, Acc, Hold, Hold, Hold, EndRed
Ice Bolt: Acc, Acc, Slow, EndRed, EndRed
Bitter Ice Blast: Acc, Acc, AccDebuff, Slow, EndRed, EndRed

That shaves about 1 endurance per second off the top. So it'd be 2.5-6.5 endurance/second usage. That should be approximately 4.5 statistically vs the 6 of my other dom. Not bad at all, I say.

So since I'm usually 1.63 or more under what my other dom puts out and stamina only gives you 1.66 more endurance per second 3 slotted with SOs, they should both operate on average on the same "acceptable to me" level of endurance consumption. HAH! I'm happy I did all that math, now I don't have to be a doubting Thomas about needing stamina.

Won't carrions break the sleep anyway, thusly making the sleep more redundant than the embrace?

For some reason your last post had a very "These are not the droids you are looking for." vibe, and I'll be asking myself if I really want/need chilling embrace. It probably would be sensible switching it out for another attack, but then it'd be a one slotted attack.

Hardly spectacular either.