Cognito

But it still doesnt address the huge gap between AoE and ST. In PvE the former rules, in PvP you just have a longish animation, lowish damage, high endurance cost attack that will gimp you.

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I don't aggree, the biggest difference between sets is the damage per attack, because recharge can be taken care of real easy.

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Yep, should have said thats third problem: Burst damage vastly superior. To my mind it ranks slightly behind the other two, but is still a truly borked factor in PvP.

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AoE attacks are about as useless as the collected wisdom of George W. Bush


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Unless your fighting Masterminds.

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1 AT out of at 10. Nobody takes them for PvP builds.

The most pressing problems with PvP balance are a) defence is rubbish compared to resistance and b) AoE attacks are about as useless as the collected wisdom of George W. Bush

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Lie mode: Shenny is contributing loads to this discussion. Serious mode: i don't think having rewards for arena PvP would be good. Maybe badges when its balanced but other than that it should be fun enough to draw people in without extra incentives.

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The problem with rewards for PvP is that the uber get more uber, and the people who arent prepared to grind to get the uber build get fed up of repeatedly getting ground to earth for no rewards.

IE Rewards only really reward dedicated PvP'ers. So its no attraction.

Of course, if PvP became anything other than the farce that it is now, and non grinded uber cookie cutter builds actually stood in the same ball park, then adding rewards may be an additional incentive.

But just on its own it will have minimal, if any, effect.

Thats very difficult to calculate. Mainly because it depends on what level of defence you have.

Remember that a Resistance Based toon will have zilch protection from defence debuffs. Absolutely zilch. They get hit often and pretty soon they will be getting hit every single attack (or 95% of them), meaning there incoming damage is x2 normal.

Now a defence based toon has two important protectors. Firstly, incoming attacks and the associated defence debuffs are more likely to miss in the first place, meaning that they avoid the debuff that way. Secondly, they innately resist defence debuffs.

Of course, when you are at 45% defence, even loosing 5% defence means that your incoming damage is doubled. BUT, at 45% defence, you avoid 90% of defence debuffs - at least the ones that need to hit you.

(IIRC there are very few "Critter" defence debuffs that auto hit. Only Crey Radiologists spring to mind but Im sure there are a few more).

So the maths is rather hard to work out there. Whilst high defence toons may suffer large proportional increases in damage with small -defence debuffs, they are unlikely to get debuffed. The closest analogy I cant think of is pushing a rock up a hill. Its hard to do, but it gets easier the nearer the top you are.

Its worth noting that by virtue of defences ability to avoid EVERYTHING, not just damage, it therefore provides protection from resist and defence debuffage (as well as innate defence debuff resistance), whereas Resistance only provides protection from resist debuffage.

All good stuff, Ill try to incorperate this stuff in v2 of guide (will still try to avoid to much maths).

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you want people to pvp and when they state something you dont agree on. you tell em to go [censored] them selfs and then wonder why some people dont pvp?

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QFT

TO GET MORE PEOPLE TO PVP YOU NEED TO APPEAL TO THOSE THAT DONT DO IT, NOT THOSE THAT DO!!!

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You need to appeal to everyone. Not specific groups.
Everyone should comment on it, whether they PvP or not. Comment as in constructive. Why? because everyone has access to it, whether they want it or not. Except the trial players, they can go rot. Or buy the game.

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You should listen to everyone, but ultimately there are only two ways to increase PvP population.

1. Get more people playing the game, a proportion of whom will PvP
2. Get PvE'ers PvPing.

Making PvP zones more attractive to people who are allready in them is quite evidently not a way to increase PvP population (although arguably they may spend more time online).

I am not absoultely clear on this myself, so If anyone knows definitvely please sing out:

AFAIK the equation for "to hit" is

[(50-defence of target) x Acc of Villain] + "To hit buff"

First thing is: TO hit buffs are pretty rare, and tend to be pretty small. The standout exception being his lordship at the end of LRSF.

However, acc buffs to end up skewing the 1% def = 2% resist.

Consider a 100 damage smash attack from an even level minion (dosent matter what it is really but using this for simplicity sake) vs 25% defence OR 50% resist

AD = Average Damage Taken

25% Defence AD = 100 x [ (0.5-0.25) +0 ] = 25

50% Resist AD = 50 x [ (0.5-0) + 0 ] = 25

Now lets add in a reasonably average to hit buff of say +10%

25% Defence AD = 100 x [ (0.5-0.25) + 0.1] = 35

25% Resist AD = 50 x [ (0.5-0) + 0.1 ] = 30


Hence, you can see Defence starts to wane. It wont be by a collosal amount until you get high (20+) tohit buffs. Off top of my head, I cant think of many critters which do have such buffs.


From practical experience, I have always had difficulty noticing any real change except for LRSF

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Psychic Civilians, Longbow, Psychic Clockwork, Rikti, Carnies, Rularuu or Behemoths Heroside.
CoT, Longbow, Nemesis, Rikti or Rularuu Villainside.

I never bothered with Family or Freakshow farming. I go for Drops first and Exp second (if at all).
Naming the specific maps might be a bad idea. Can you picture a Big Red "NERF ME!" button?

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Nerfing them would be a good Idea IMO.

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you want people to pvp and when they state something you dont agree on. you tell em to go [censored] them selfs and then wonder why some people dont pvp?

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QFT

TO GET MORE PEOPLE TO PVP YOU NEED TO APPEAL TO THOSE THAT DONT DO IT, NOT THOSE THAT DO!!!

A few rough pointers. With Elec Elec I would play to strengths which is AoE damage and End drain. Lvl 40-50, for levelling, is primarily about big teams and big AoE damage.

If you spend any significant time soloing (a much less efficient way of levelling) then you may wish to mitigate the below device:

Elec Blast: Make sure you take, and slot well, Ball Lightning, Short Circuit, Aim, and Thunderous blast

Elec Melee: Build Up is the main thing to take. Power Drain the next most important. If you are feeling brave and are in good teams, Elec Feild and Thunderstrike are very robust Melee AoE attacks.

As an elec/elec I would capatalise on end drain with Elec epic set. There is a good AoE cone in that, worth taking, and Elec Armour (probably the best armour of the epics). The hold and EMP are good robust powers but not a requisite.

The only exceptions are a) When enemies have "to hit" buffs (covered in guide), and b) When either defence or resistance are effectively capped (pretty much covered)

In practice, a) is pretty rare.

It is true that the effective "cap" of damage mitigation is less than 90% when facing higher conning enemies and / or non-minions, but not markedly so.

In general, it is extremely unusual for 1% defence not to equal 2% resistance, unless I am mistaken. Which is a possibility. If you have more examples, please point em out and ill stick em in next draft of guide.

(PS I presume you are not referring to the old non-scaling defence, when 1% defence was definately not 2% resistance)

One would hope so, although inevitably people will prefer Devs to focus on their preferred aspect of the game.

From the Dev point of veiw they would like to focus on as high as possible subscription rates. I would imagine this is a balance of a) Focussing attention where most player base is (i.e. PvE) and b) trying to draw in new customers (PvE and PvP)

If I was a dev, I would probably keep maintaining PvE expansion.

In terms of resources put to PvP, my priority would be to close the gap between PvP and PvE builds as much as possible, before doing anything else.

They really need to up debt to far higher levels. Ideally more than ever.

Defence based toons need to add more to a team rather than it simply being all about damage.

Yep, just checked myself. Will put it into draft 2

Just to counter, many people dont give two hoots about PvP, and would rather it withered and died so the Dev's concentrated on PvE. Fair play, just as its fair play many people are screaming for more PvP. Thats just there opinion.

My own opinion is that I think healthy PvP is good for the long term vitality of the game.

However, healthy PvP will only occur when PvE'ers are tempted into PvP land. And there are herculean obstacles to this.

1. PVP is now dominated by uber builds based on grinding. Many people do not want to PvP and repeatedly get thrashed by a fully IOd out PvP build.

Now I know many people will say "Its player skill that counts". I disagree. Im pretty bad at PvP, but I can garuntee I can whip anybodys behind with a PvP build, infinite inf, against a PvP build based on just SO.

People naturally want a level playing feild. Otherwise, why bother?

I appreciate that people dont want to sacrifice their 10 billion inf PVP build and want to feel uber whipping other peoples behind. Dont blame you. But unfortunately, I veiw IOs as having a devasatating effect on attracting people to PvE. I cant see how it can be solved or sold. Its absolutely killed it dead in the water for me and everyone I know.

2. PvE Builds are utter rubbish in PvP.

Basically, if you want to be a good PvE player, you stuff every AoE power you can get into your build. PvP is entirely the reverse. Add to that a load of ill thought out differences in power utility between PvP and PvE means if you want to PvP you need a PvP build which will largely be gimped in PvE (mitigated to some degree by your 10 billion inf build). More importantly, a PvE build is just there to make PvP builds feel uber by getting completely spanked.


If people truly want PvP to thrive, the answer is not to whine and whinge at the dev's to develop it. It's to provide sensible ways and suggestions to attract PvE'ers into PvP.


If you are feeling optimistic you can look at the recent change to Hover (immune to -fly) as an inkling that the Devs are looking at making PVE builds better in PVE. Its this sort of stuff that needs to happen to develop PvP.

Personally I think its almost insurmountable, but others may see more hope than me.

Its AoE potential is pretty good.

When it comes to End drain, you really start to see the devastating effects this has when you have a couple of "drainers" in the team. Pair up with another Elec blaster for instance. The two of you can drain entire mobs down to zero in a second or two when you fire off Short Circuit. And im sure everyone recalls the agony of zero endurance without stamina.

Thats the funny thing about end drain. Being the only one makes it a rather poor effect. But with a few of you, you become devastating.

NB: Uf you are Elec/Elec, then Short Circuit + Power Drain is very tasty....

Yep, 1% def = 2% res. I can show you the maths if you want, but I want to keep this guide free of maths.

Defence effectively "caps" at 45%, which is equal to 90% damage mitigation (its slightly less vs higher conning enemies, and non-minions, but not vastly).

Resistance caps at 75%, or 90% for Tanks and Brutes. Just remembered, I think its 90% for Khelds too? And im not sure about VEATs. Can someone confirm so i can add it to draft 2 of guide?

Thanks all. Seems to be a useful guide then. I hope to use some of the comments and tidy it up iinto a draft 2. Comments / Suggestions welcome.

Keep Standing!

Ice/Ice (With fighting and medicine pool. Now thats a tank)
WP/Mace

Kin/Rad
Rad/Elec. My first 50, and a lot of fun.

Spines / DA

Nothing else really grabs me. Thats the only combo that hasnt been a yawnfest for me.

Grav/Rad
Fire/Storm
Earth/Sonic
Illusion/FF

Toying with the idea of a Plant/Empath

"Play the game how you want" is simply not good enough IMO. Because sometimes how you play upsets, irritates, offends, or is detrimental to other people.

So, being impolite, abusive, or ganking is not on.

UNfortunately, the blithe attitude that "farming doesnt effect anyone else" is utter nonsense. It effects the whole community. The only question is to what degree.

Farmers may wish to argue it is to a minimal (or near zero) and therefore acceptable degree. But maintaining an attitude of "IT AFFECTS YOU NOT AT ALL SO BACK OFF" is not helpful, as its not true.

ULtimately I would imagine this game is supposed to be played in the way that is fun. But for everybody.

Its a good point about homophobes. We cant go around dictating how Sexual relationships are supposed to be played. But we can go round saying that perscuting homosexuality is wrong and we can go round saying that public displays of sexual behaviour is wrong (irrespective of sexuality) due to the offense this would cause many people.

"Do what you want" is just overtly simplistic and not thought through IMO.

I think that new sets will be built with "new twist" in mind. Whilst an elec troller set will no doubt have some standards (like holds, immobs, and pet which is almost already there), the 3 or 4 remainder will probably give a "Spin" to the set.

Things like a "Charged Atmosphere" aura, causing enemies powers to misfire or drain more end would be a novel "control". Or a "Conduit" toggle stun, which also causes end loss of enemy and your end gain - but which discharges (perhaps painfully for both controller and target) when either enemy reaches zero end or troller gets to full.

Just examples anyway. New things could be thought of.