Chad Gulzow-Man

You know what, you're right... I forgot, it only detoggles powers that do an enemy debuff, like Willpower's Rise to the Challenge. My bad. I was just coming back to correct that after thinking about it for a bit.

For starters, Energy Drain didn't originally have a heal component... it was added in Issue 13, over three years after the set debuted, as a way to balance the underperforming set. Now, a little less than three years after that, they feel the need to balance it further as they proliferate it to new ATs, and they've chosen to move that heal to a different power.

As you mentioned, Energy Drain currently heals 30% (unenhanced) in an "optimal" setting. That means while you're getting punched to paste by 10 enemies all at once before you can even activate it. But it's also completely contextual; if there's no one around you, then it won't heal you in the least.

Now, with Energize, you can heal yourself a guaranteed 25% minimum every 2 minutes, whether you've got 20 dudes surrounding you or zero, AND the new recharge bonus in the taunt aura will shorten that in situations where it's needed more often. Couple that with the fact that the passive +Resistance powers are getting buffed, and you'll find yourself needing that heal less often to boot.

Now, as for your observation that the taunt aura is being placed in the wrong power... well, I can't really say I argue with you there. (Don't toggles with Taunt Auras get dropped automatically when you're mezzed? So... if you get mezzed, won't you need to restart the toggle whose primary purpose is to keep you from getting mezzed in the first place? ) But it's still just a few days after the announcement; the developers very likely have a way to make it work in mind. If it still seems broken once we actually get a chance to play with it, then by all means, scream "Nerf!" all you like.

Actually, it worked TOO well. It was set up so the more players targetting you, the harder it was to hit you... but it didn't discriminate between friend and enemy, so you could have an entire team worth of people hiding around a corner snickering with a lone defender sitting in an open room as bait. It was obviously crazy exploitable.

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Yes, I know. It also wasn't entirely true--the goal was to get more people PVPing in general, and to attract those who don't usually participate into giving it a shot. He never specifically said that the changes were made to aggravate the pre-existing PVP crowd, just that they were made with non-PVPers in mind... but it was a very blunt wording, and regardless, it's not something you want to say to a group that's already feeling alienated.

I still maintain that some of the changes NEEDED to happen, especially the least popular of them: heal decay and travel suppression. It's all relative; some people claim kiting and quick-healing are fair tactics in PVP, while others think they're "cheap." But again, as I said in my previous post here, the dial was cranked all the way to 11 on these when it would probably have been fine to set at a 3 or 4.

Agreed. Once the iXP bug gets fixed, I think Keyes is going to be much more popular, since there's a lot to fight (and they respawn regularly). At the very least, I think it'll be the iTrial of choice for people who have yet to unlock all their slots.

There was a big stink all around about PVP in the Issue 13 beta. Those in the closed beta broke the NDA and started raising a stink about it on the public forums. They resorted to personal attacks on the devs (making donut jokes about Positron and saying all matter of things about Castle). The community rep, Lighthouse, put his foot in his mouth and lost his job over it.

I still maintain that Castle had the right idea with virtually every change he made to PVP, but he cranked the dials to 11 when a 3 or 4 would have sufficed. And since the most vocal members of the PVP community were mudslinging the whole time and wouldn't work with the developers, we got the version that rolled out and have only had bugfixes since.

I'm not saying the ENTIRE PVP community was to blame, either--there were several who were calm and polite, if earnest, about their feelings on the new system. But, when you're looking around in the zoo, no one pays attention to the antelopes peacefully eating grass when the monkey cage next door has a poo-flinging fight going on.

Egos were asserted on both sides of the fence, rules were broken on both sides, and feelings were hurt... With that kind of history, are people seriously curious as to why PVP questions get vague dodgey answers?

Of course, I wasn't really participating on either side of the PVP argument in the i13 beta; I was too busy protesting effing Day Jobs. Hate them soooo much...

The numbers are going to be better for everything except damage by rerolling his DP/Therm Corruptor as a Therm/DP Defender.

The secondary effects of the different ammo types are a nice bit of extra fluff for everyone else, but on Defenders it can actually be worth using something other than "all fire ammo, all the time."

... I take it you didn't see this post that Arcanaville made two days ago in this very thread?

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showp...&postcount=113

I've been asking for this since before Proliferation 2.0. I'm so friggin' stoked.

I have a Necro/Poison and Thugs/Poison and I love both. It's currently the only set that makes me feel active as a Mastermind, instead of "that guy who follows the pets around."

Standard Code Rant. >_>

*activates Elude and high-tails it out of Dodge!*

I have faith in them too. I have faith that they'll listen to the concerns of the players when making a decision and will weigh those concerns against their intended goal. Sometimes their idea of fun or fair does not mesh with that of the general playerbase, and they'll take that into account before the decision becomes final (and sometimes even after).

This is just another example of people saying, "Hello, we have a concern here!" and awaiting a developer response on it. Maybe they'll reply directly, maybe they won't, but I guarantee that someone on the team has read this thread and given it thought.

Well, for starters, there is a difference between "Hidden" and stealth... If I'm not mistaken, Hide actually applies a status to you, and the suppression of powers is actually tied to whether or not that status is applied to you currently.

So, following your suggestion, they either have to add a "Hidden" status to Energy Cloak--which may be an option, or it may have auto-critting baked into the status at well and not be an option--or they have to create a new "Stealthed" status. And then they'd have to give the Stealthed status to all other stealth powers... and should it be given by using a Stealth IO? Should it suppress other powersets' toggles? You'd have people complaining either way about that.

So, in all fairness, it might not be as cut-and-dry as you're assuming it is. Or maybe it is, and they've got that all taken care of already.

We don't know, because the developers haven't said anything about it yet. Until then, I have yet to see anyone be unfairly critical about this change... no one has mentioned "slap in the face" or "I'm cancelling my account" in any posts talking about it. They're just voicing concerns that haven't gotten an official answer yet.

From the transcript/summary of yesterday's Ustream chat:
At least they know the players want it.

I KNOW, RIGHT!?!

D'oh, forgot Ice Melee had Taunt!

In that case, Ice Patch, definitely. I'd be surprised if Frozen Aura were left as-is on a Stalker as well.

Probably both... you need to make room for Placate as well.

I'm going to guess that the blurb they gave Comic Con was written prior to the reveal of CoH Freedom two weeks ago.

It's actually a 25% chance, at least according to Mids'. And the Chance of Fear is an AoE--successfully landing the Assassin's Strike can potentially cause fear to any critter in the group. It's kind of rad when it works.

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To further sidetrack the discussion, I have a hard time disagreeing with this. I love me some Stalkers, and they definitely aren't the "glass cannons" they seem like they ought to be... they're just glass capguns right now.

My suggested fix was unpopular, but I still feel like it fit the intended playstyle of a Stalker: buff single-target attacks to do 10-15% more damage by default than Scrappers with the same damage cap, with a small (5%-ish) nerf to their current AoE damage as a way to specialize.

Well, it does say "currently" in there.

I'm also not specifically arguing a change to Overload... just Scirion's reasons for it. He was stating that the power was "worthless" because of the rest of his situation; I was informing him that it was simply unnecessary to him, and that there were many good reasons that other players might need it to fall back on.

Personally, I'd obviously love +Res thrown into the power, but not if it meant the complete loss of +Def.

(Apologies to Scirion for the masculine pronouns if you're female.)