ClawsandEffect
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Posts
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Quote:Well said.Originally Posted by Winterminal
First and foremost: I also dislike the fact that Soul Drain is remaining a PBAoE, like its counterparts throughout the game. As someone who plays ranged almost exclusively, Dark Manipulation's power lineup was a severe disappointment.
That being said, I completely understand why Soul Drain is remaining as a PBAoE: Dark Manipulation is a very close-range set. I appreciate the Devs' efforts toward making further Blaster secondary sets more unique when compared with one another, despite disagreeing with or disliking this particular instance. While I wish the two impending Dark sets had more synergy with each other, given their themed similarities and matching secondary effects, they are not the first to suffer from that "problem." The two Fire sets contrast with each other as well.
When Issue 21 goes live, I will still attempt a Dark/Dark Blaster. I will probably end up abusing Penumbral Grasp, skipping most of the melee attacks (as well as Dark Pit because I have always thought it sucked), and saving Soul Drain and Dark Consumption for teaming. If it works, hooray! If not, well, I have other alts...
Personally disliking something is not a good reason to demand it be changed.
I don't think Soul Drain remaining a PBAoE is going to be a major problem. Itwill be particularly useful on teams where there is some means of making sure you hit themax number of targets with it, as well as some way to keep everything from turning you into a grease spot when you use it.
I will be adapting the same kind of playstyle I developed with my Fire/Fire blapper. Frenetically jumping in and out of melee using PBAoEs on the fly.
Also, I think everyone has forgotten here that the thematically paired set will be coming with an AoE immobilize, which will serve the crucial role of stopping things from chasing you when you jump out of melee after using Soul Drain. There are also enough to-hit debuffs in both sets that you only need a moderate amount of defense to gain decent survivability.
I still think the drawbacks of Soul Drain are being blown out of proportion, especially when the means of avoiding those drawbacks are being given to us in the same sets Soul Drain is coming with.
That said, you can agree with the inclusion of the power, or disagree, as long as you accept that the devs do not design powersets that can only be played one way or they will not function.
Also: Dark/Dark/Soul blaster: Tenebrous Tentacles for immobilizy goodness, Dark Pit for the first bit of stun, and if you took Soul Mastery you have Oppressive Gloom available, which will stack with Dark Pit to ensure that even bosses are helpless and easy Soul Drain fodder. Add to that the fact that you can have a second AoE immobilize and you can immobilize the bosses as well. Plenty of tools to let you Soul Drain stuff with impunity.
And with the changes to APPs....you can do all this by level 38. -
Quote:That's why you jump in, fire Soul Drain, and jump back out before you fire your cones. Where does it say you're not allowed to move after you use your Build Up power? If it's like every other version of Soul Drain, the buff will be active for 30 seconds instead of the more usual 10 seconds for Build Up powers, that leaves you PLENTY of time to line up a couple cones.Originally Posted by Cptn_Courageous
Cone shaped attacks? Going to miss half your targets in a big group because you'll be too close.
I strongly disagree.Quote:I would rather see Soul Drain dropped for Build-up or made into a Targeted AOE.
I don't think all Blaster secondaries should be exactly the same. Soul Drain being available in a blaster secondary is part of what is going to make Dark Manipulation unique among them.
What is going to end up happening is that Dark Blast will end up not being the best synergistic pairing with Dark Manipulation, even though it matches the theme.
You could either do what I suggested above and jump back out of the spawn to line up your cones, or you could pair it with something like Rad Blast that has a PBAoE and a Targeted AoE in it (you can use those in melee as well, you know. I frequently forget that Fireball is a ranged power)
Soul Drain in a blaster secondary is a neat addition, and it gives people more playstyle options. Changing powers to what YOU would prefer them to be in order to suit ONE playstyle better would just remove the option to play your blaster differently.
Different people play their characters in different ways. Did it occur to you that a Soul Drain-equipped blaster on a team with a decent tank will be an absolute monster? You won't get agro from the piddly amount of damage Soul Drain does, and the tank will keep them clumped together for ease of lining up cones. -
Quote:I agree on the Gaussian's.....UNLESS you want to slot the full set for the defense bonus, in which case it's worth it.Originally Posted by EJI
I'd drop the chance to build-up proc (gaussian's) from build-up. A 5% chance every 30s isn't that great. I do like the hp bonus. Another option would be to slot this as you have aim and drop a set of oblits for a purple set if it's in your budget.
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Quote:You said that temp powers were available for Candy Canes, but you didn't specify that the rez power was one of them.Originally Posted by Roderick
That is correct. Which is why I said that.
I was just clarifying for the OPs benefit. -
Quote:The term "Large Run Speed Bonus" is what's relevant here.Originally Posted by Katie V
I just checked in game. Five pieces of Kinetic Combat gives three set bonuses, named "Large Improved Run Speed Bonus", "Large Improved Flight Speed Bonus, and "Large Improved Jumping Bonus". This overlaps with Aegis, which gives a "Large Improved Runspeed Bonus" for two pieces, but not with Performance Shifter, which gives a "Large Improved Movement Bonus".
Technically, Kinetic Combat gives you 3 different bonuses when you slot 5 of them, all named "Large <movement> Bonus"
The Performance Shifter gives you a bonus named "Large Movement Bonus", which is not the same as a Large Run Speed Bonus.
That's where your conflict is coming from, the fact that Kinetic Combat actually gives you 3 separate bonuses at the same time, and not a generic Movement bonus like Performance Shifter.
It's the same reason we can slot 5 LotG +Recharges AND 5 7.5% recharge bonuses, the bonuses have different names. In your case here, the bonuses DO have the same name, so they count toward your maximum of 5. -
Quote:If you wait before you hit it again you can effectively double it's duration though.Originally Posted by Oathbound
Double Fiery Embrace shouldn't do anything. It just sets a flag for your powers saying "You can do this extra thing while in this mode" it shouldn't matter at all if you have that flag twice.
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Quote:Could always go with a scrapper that has a taunt aura as well.Originally Posted by Siolfir
The higher base damage means that the +damage is nicer, but to maximize Fulcrum Shift for both parties and to use Transference and Transfusion, the Kin is up close to melee also. While they're going to do less damage, Brutes hold aggro better than Scrappers - making it safer for the squishy little Kin to help them both melt faces.
Perhaps a /Shield Defense of some kind? -
I rolled one as soon as I heard about the changes a few weeks ago. I figure by the time I get to the powers that are being changed, the changes will have already happened.
Might be rolling a Spines/EA scrapper as well. Need to figure out which of my seldom played lowbies are getting the axe. -
Grant Cover is virtually mandatory for a Shield tank that plans on being a main tank.
Between that and being able to put Membranes in Active Defense to boost your DDR that way, you should be able to get close to SR levels of DDR with relative ease.
The build looks solid as is, but I would try to get a few more percent to your defense. Mostly to cover that DDR hole you currently have.
And I hear you about Reactive. I've adjusted my stance on it, now I only go with that one if I can plausibly explain why my enemies are being lit on fire by my attacks. -
Hmmmmmm.......
Definitely has some potential to it.
I'll have to check this out when it goes live. -
Quote:This is my plan.Originally Posted by Angelic_EU
On a Controller I would suggest Illusion because Phantom Army can take care of your damage while you are using TM. Same goes to any of the MM pets as well.
I already placeheld the name Illusion of Time on my home server. Couldn't believe the name wasn't taken, given how obvious it is.
The character's bio is going to read: Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.
A cookie to all who get the reference. -
Quote:I see you've never played a /Stone Brute then.Originally Posted by Kangstor
Secondaries get weaker base numbers compared to primary pool so example of stone/robotics won't be that overpowered since bots won't have that much damage output and a robot/stone won't have enough taunt to keep bots alive to be overpowered.
Stone Armor, even as a secondary, is still so ridiculously survivable that it would be a cakewalk to tank things for your bots. As long as you didn't set your difficulty so high that you routinely exceeded the agro cap your bots would likely never die and just keep pumping out damage.
Maybe freeform power selection could work if they had coded it into the game from the beginning, but shoehorning it into the game NOW would pretty much break the entire game -OR- it would mean that we would see nothing new for at least a couple years while the entire dev team worked on trying to balance a completely unbalanceable system.
This suggestion has been shot down many times already. And it has been shot down for a good reason. Allowing freeform power selection in this game is a horrible idea.
Look at the possibility of Shield Defense/Fire Manipulation. On the Shield side you'd get: The damage boost and taunt of Against All Odds, Shield Charge, Tanker defense numbers since it's the primary (able to softcap almost without IOs at all). A passive HP boost. On the Manipulation side you'd get: 2 damage auras, Fire Sword Circle, Combustion, Burn, Build Up, Fire Sword. Even with tanker damage numbers, that would be stupidly overpowered. I mean, 2 damage auras being buffed by AAO? FOUR PBAoE attacks? You'd have the ultimate overpowered farmer there.
And if you went with Pyre Mastery or Mu Mastery, you'd get even more AoE. -
Quote:......you could have at least fixed my typo when you quoted it.Originally Posted by Bionut911
By the way Claws. I love the way you think !
This is my new sig as of now.
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Quote:I believe you are in the lead, sir.Originally Posted by TroyHickman
We should have an ego-off. Loser writes the winner's biography.
I'm not sure if anyone else runs forum searches to find out if anyone has talked about them
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Quote:Yes.Originally Posted by Lycanus
....at least give us an untouchable period and shorten the rooted period so we can actually, you know, change positions and maybe actually use the power for it's intended purpose of getting back into the fight quickly
I will support this every time it comes up.
I also think Revive should get a large regen boost for a short time after you use the power. Something to make it more than just an Awaken that you have to spend a power pick on.
Maybe +500% regen for 20 seconds when you use it?
I don't mind the rooted period, it just irritates me that I can and will be killed before I can even do anything to attempt to prevent it. The whole standing up slowly thing is actually kind of thematically appropriate. -
Quote:Why do you have 3 End Reductions in an Electric Armor build?Originally Posted by Stryph
Right now my KM/Elec runs with the toggles 3x Res and 3x End
Electric Armor is the LAST set that should be having endurance problems, and if you ARE having end problems, put the end reductions in your attacks instead, since they burn more end than your toggles. -
Quote:It causes me a big problem.Originally Posted by UberGuy
that still does nothing for the argument that strong -regen effects makes a Regen feel gimp. If that's the case for someone, that someone has built their Regen poorly. Does having your Regen shut off (or severely reduced) cause a problem?
My Regen isn't built with gobs and gobs of recharge bonuses, I'm just barely over the threshold of perma Dull Pain.
When I fight something like Longbow and I get hit with multiple -regen powers, even Instant Healing can't get me back to actually regenerating. It's not that the powers are that potent on their own that causes the problem, it's the probability that you will have more than one of them stacked on you at a time. A single -500 regen debuff isn't a big deal, but 4 or 5 of them IS a big deal. 4 is enough to shut down ALL regeneration, even with Instant healing active.
Since my moderate defense and high regen is what I rely on for most normal missions, getting my regeneration debuffed to nothing is a severe problem for me. -
Quote:Well, they do, but those are generally just GMs and server monitors and such. The people there to make sure everything is operating normally and to provide in-game help to players. I doubt there are more than 4 or 5 overnight people at Paragon Studios, tops. Maybe less if the GMs are also qualified server maintenance techs. I'm sure there's one guy who works there whose entire job is to watch a bank of lights on a computer screen and call someone if one of them changes color.Originally Posted by Giant2005
Yiou know, in all my years of playing MMOs, never in any of them had I considered this. I just assumed they had a team there around the clock.
None of those people have the authority to make changes to the game or take the servers offline, so there needs to be someone present who DOES have that authority: The devs.
It's kind of like how the clerks at a convenience store can't access the safe or make policy changes while they are there at 2 in the morning. A manager has to do those things, and the managers don't work 24 hours a day.
I'm sure if they have a "ZOMG the servers are on fire!" situation one or more of the devs will be called in, but for routine maintenance and patching it'll have to be when they are there for their normal work day. -
Quote:Yeah, that sucks.Originally Posted by Giant2005
This is absolutely a valid point. The timing of the Devs with their daily maintenance couldn't be worse.
I just convinced a significant number of my guildies from another MMO I used to play to come try out CoH due to the F2P. Considering we are all Australian and the daily "maintenance" happens to be in our primetime, everytime they try to play they can't.
Those guildies of mine now laugh at my attempts to get them to play CoH.
Considering the newest round of daily maintenance happens to coincide with their F2P announcements, how many other Australians/New Zealanders/Pacific Players have they managed to deter from playing CoH?
But they have to do it SOMETIME. No matter when they decide to do their maintenance they're going to be inconveniencing SOMEONE.
It simply makes the most sense to time it so it inconveniences the fewest people possible. Since they have the information of how many people are logged in at any given point in the day, I can only assume that the time they do the maintenance is when the fewest people would be logged in.
Sorry dude, I don't think it can really be helped. You happen to be playing a US based game in a country that runs on the exact opposite schedule. -
I can't even comprehend playing that way.
I get far too attached to my characters, several of them have 5+ years of constantly evolving backstory, and it would just feel wrong to delete them simply because something changed in the game. (Especially if that change was beneficial to one or more of them)
It just seems like a very strange way to play, given that if you don't PL your characters to 50 between issue releases you will end up never seeing any of the end game stuff, because you had to delete them ALL due to a minor change to one character's powerset. -
Controversial statement follows:
All farming in this game is exploitative to some degree. Granted, the type of farming the devs generally leave alone is definitely the least exploitative variety, but there is still some exploitation present.
You can't say that deliberately setting up a situation where you can defeat hordes of enemies easily while it is virtually impossible for them to effectively fight back isn't a little exploitative. Not with much credibility at least.
Think about how you build a farming character and how you choose what you farm with them. Fire farms are set up in AE with custom enemies who only use fire damage, and are run with characters that are virtually impossible to hurt with fire. One of the more popular normal game farms is still Battle Maiden. That one is usually run with a Fire/Kin/Earth Controller softcapped to S/L defense....fighting enemies with nothing but S/L attacks.
It's not nearly as exploitative as taking advantage of unbalanced rewards in AE, not by a long shot, but it's not even close to a fair fight either. It's like taking an M1 Abrams tank to a gunfight. And things like that are a little exploitative.
I don't see many people farming Carnies with their Fire/Kins or SS/Fires, people who have those characters choose to farm fire enemies or S/L enemies, because those enemies are completely ineffective against them. I don't know about you, but that sounds pretty exploitative to me.
Don't get me wrong, I don't have anything particularly against farming other than that I find it boring. But I think the people who insist they aren't exploiting anything when they're farming things that can't effectively fight back are deluding themselves a little bit.
The fact that there is at least small amount of exploitation present when you're farming makes it very unlikely, in my opinion, that the devs will dedicate a forum to it. I don't know for sure, but it seems fairly reasonable to assume that the devs are seeing it in a similar light. -
Quote:Heroes and Villains got a new type of reward. Rogues and Vigilantes got the ability to go anywhere in the game and team with anyone regardless of their alignment.
Also it's not equal. Hero's/vilains gained rewards and lost nothing.
Rogues and Vigilantes also get 60 merits every time they reaffirm their alignment, which is more than you can get for any other soloable task in the game.
Now, I DO think there should be Rogue and Vigilante specific contacts in Paragon and the Rogue Isles. It is perfectly plausible that there would be people in both locations who would be seeking their services.
I still don't agree that we need the ability to ignore the effect of Tip missions on your reputation. If you want to team with your friends without impeding your progress, either get your tips out of the way first, or simply play a different character to run those missions. You DO have more than one character you could log in with, right? -
Quote:The rez power is one of the ones available via candy canes, unless I'm greatly mistaken.Originally Posted by Roderick
I haven't been in there this time around, so I don't know if Father Time's mission is available.
Even if it's not, you can buy Candy Canes from the market, and trade them in at the Candy Keeper for any of the Winter Badges, Costume parts and/or Temp Powers. -
Quote:Well, actually, they are more like 30 second duration click powers.Originally Posted by Ironblade
Technically, the Good vs Evil jump pack and the Steampunk pack are toggles and you can use them with Ninja Run.
The devs wanted to them to have the ability to be shut off prematurely, and the only way they could do that mechanically was to make it a toggle with a set duration. (much like Phase Shift and Hibernate)
A true toggle is one that stays active until you manually shut it off. Since the Jump Pack and Steam Jump powers don't work like that, they are exempt from Ninja Run's "no travel powers" clause. -
Quote:Are you fighting a lot of Thermal, Cold Domination, Electric, Energy Aura, or Kinetics users? Because those sets have powers in them that drain your endurance. Anything Electric in particular will drain the hell out of you just by hitting you. If you see an Electric/Thermal Corruptor heading your way, prepare to say buh-bye to your end bar. And if you've ever fought an Electric/Electric brute, scrapper, or tank, the same. A good PvP build for one of them can fire Power Sink every 15 seconds or so, and they have a toggle that will keep hitting your end bar too. Not to mention the drain in their attacks (I HATE fighting those guys with a melee character)Originally Posted by Shuriken_BladeX
I'm just scared to sacrifice damage. Because the two I have the main problem on are my PVP guys. Especially with people with massive regen powers
If you're only having trouble in PvP it could be that you aren't actually doing anything wrong with your build, and are just being hit with a lot of end draining powers. And if you are getting killed because you're running out of end, well, their tactic is working then isn't it?
It's especially bad if you are playing a set that doesn't have significant end drain resistance. Electric is virtually immune to it, and Dark has very good resistance to it, but most of the other sets are vulnerable to it to some degree.
Are you using Hasten and Strength of Will frequently? Those both have end crashes too. Hasten usually isn't that bad, but it hurts if your build already has end problems.