BellaStrega

Back in 2005 I made a frustrated comment in a team (friends, we teamed daily for a few months straight, my most teamiest time ever) that got quoted on the forum by one of my teammates (who hasn't played in ages).

Anyway, what I said then has been quoted in a few places as "Kali's Law" and "Kali's Corollary." Anyway:

I don't think both of these are nearly as true as they seemed at the time, but it does still seem to happen, and by far not just in City of Heroes.

Redraw has always been such a terrible idea.

Which is applicable to brutes as well as scrappers and does nothing to demonstrate that it's less OP for brutes than it is for scrappers.

If they proliferate SS to scrappers, it will likely be reduced across the board. Not because it's uniquely OP for scrappers, but because it's simply overpowered due to having a permanent +damage buff that applies to far more than super strength. Scrapper damage levels don't make it suddenly "impossible to ignore." It's always been impossible to ignore, but the devs have chosen to allow it to exist in that state.

But benchmarks won't tell the whole story. It's like comparing Midnight Grasp to Headsplitter on raw numbers alone (and ignoring that one is lethal with a 19 degree cone and the other negative energy and single target), or looking at how a scrapper performs with Soul Drain saturated 50% of the time compared to other scrapper sets vs. how a brute performs with Soul Drain saturated 50% of the time compared to other brute sets. There will always be a larger disparity in scrapper sets in terms of differing damage buffs due to the higher base damage.

All things being equal, Titan Weapons has more AOE attacks and thus higher AOE potential than super strength. The cone attacks also have a 10 foot range and two of them hit fairly hard. So while the SS scrapper will hit harder with foot stomp, the TW character has titan sweep, arc of destruction, as well as defensive sweep whereas SS has single-target attacks. Comparing similar powers one for one will favor SS and SS may outperform other single target sets, but even with raged up foot stomp, will it outperform the AoE sets in the manner you're suggesting?

I didn't say the disparity would disappear, just that you were going for the most extreme example in the comparison.

The other thing about whirling smash is that it has a shorter animation, shorter recharge, and a lower endurance cost. It's also supplemented by three cones, whereas SS has no other AoE at all.

I didn't tell you the math was a perceptual issue. It was your statement that the math demonstrates that SS would be more OP compared to scrapper titan weapons because of comparing one attack in each set, and doing so in the absence of performance comparisons between the two sets across the board.

If the only way they can port SS to scrappers is to reduce its overall performance, it's overpowered where it stands, especially compared to other powersets that are virtually identical on tanks, brutes, and scrappers. The overperformance would be the same relative to the AT's intended functionality.

The argument that smaller numbers means it's less broken for other ATs strikes me as more of a matter of perception and psychology than anything else. Sort of like people being more willing to spend $1.99 on something than $2.00.

It wouldn't be even more broken on scrappers. It might be more obvious, but the relative brokenness is virtually identical.

This particular argument is one I've never trusted, never believed, and will likely never trust or believe.

I would argue that bolded bit is not always the case, and has not always been the case. My experience in the past was that /SS tankers could generally keep up with my scrappers. Part of that is foot stomp and part was KO blow hitting hard targets really hard. It's less of a thing now with spring attack and judgement to add more AOE, as well as some sets (like claws) getting buffs.

The percentages aren't meaningful without sustained performance over time, and sustained performance over time is really good.

That's precisely why I thought it was the king of brute sets for all these years. I have two SS/* brutes, after all.

That bolded part is the part I don't believe.

I don't want the set gutted either, but I prefer to see explanations like "if it gets ported to scrappers, it'll get nerfed" rather than convoluted explanations in which unbalanced really means balanced. The reason being that the latter is never convincing, at least not to me.

This is the first and only plausible argument against proliferating to scrappers I have ever read. That is, the admission that it is overpowered in its current state.

Also, I have never read a convincing argument on this forum as to why Super Strength is "too powerful" to be a scrapper set, while it's balanced for brutes and tankers. If it does too much damage for a scrapper to use, then it pushes brute or tanker damage too high in the first place.

I use it on cooldown on my characters, although I don't sell the inspirations. I mostly just use them.

Such a change makes no sense to me. It's not as if inspirations don't already drop like snowflakes in a blizzard.

I noticed this as well, on Tuesday. It looked like it was "grayed out", like temp powers on a MoTF or disabled powers when exemplared.

Or you brought break frees and ran out because you don't have that many inspirations to start with and you're running into more than one mezzer in said mission.

While it may seem invigorating to argue from a black and white perspective like this, you're ignoring a lot of the actual facts involved in gameplay to reach your "it's your own fault" conclusion.

I know you'll say anything to support your ridiculous moon logic, but it would help if your declarations had some resemblance to the real world.

This argument was stupid when it was used in reference to Knights of the Old Republic 12 years ago, and it's still stupid now.

Actually, the other arguments in your post are pretty stupid too.

Haven't you ever had a critical attack - a mez, or the attack that will finish off a mob in a single blow - miss? With the consequences being anything from taking another 10-15 seconds to end the fight all the way to defeat?

As far as breakfrees go, you don't always have them.