Cognito

I think the PvP changes are good. It levels the playing feild.

If old school PvPers want to play the old system, it seems totally reasonable to have Arena have an "Old School" rules option. They can carry on their fights there.

I am still skeptical about all this talk of "PvP skill supercedes any and all builds". I wonder if a hardcore PvPer with an AR/Ice Blaster )without concealment pool and only fly power, with S0s only) deuled me they could compensate enough.

However. Until they do something about phase shift, i cant see myself doing more than trying out pvp for a short while, and getting bored of me attack, you shift, you attack, me fight back, you shift, nonsense.

Ok im probably being dense...

I would love to adjust the order of my alts (now up to 48...) in the selection screen - yet everytime I do so, when I return to the screen after play or logging it has "pinged" back to what it was before I was adjusting order.

This has being going on for ages, and whilst it isnt a biggie it has been a minor irritation for a while...

Anyclues?

Id say 100%. Most of whom would leave the zone. Many of whom who would be disgusted.

The attempts the devs have made to make the laughable PvP game are, in themselves, laughable.

I applaude them for the most part. But a CoV accolade badge needin Sirens Call?

Pathetic

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
TO ATTRACT NONPVPERS INTO PVP ZONES YOU NEED TO APPEAL TO THEM. NOT TO PEOPLE ALLREADY PVPING.

[/ QUOTE ]

This isn't as good an idea as you may think. We already have rewards in PvP zones, and this only creates ill will between PvPers and PvEers.
"We want Shivans so we can do a hard TF!"
"Lol, it's a PvP zone so I can fight you if I like"
"But there's no other way to get Shivans!"
and so forth.

If there were PvP rewards, they need to be for PVP, not for PvEing in PvP zones, and they need to have a negligble effect on PvE. (Like the Guildwars lion emote)

[/ QUOTE ]

I didnt say anything about rewards. I said that to atract PvE plyers to PvP,its them you need to listen to, not hardcore PvP players.

Personally, rewards wouldnt tempt me to PvP zones. As has been said, even if they did, I would jump in at 3.00 am, grab reward, and scarper at any actual PvP.

iirc someone (me) started a good thread on how to attract PvE'ers into the game. Quite a good discussion was had, marred only by the occassional stubborn refusal to accept this fact:

TO ATTRACT NONPVPERS INTO PVP ZONES YOU NEED TO APPEAL TO THEM. NOT TO PEOPLE ALLREADY PVPING.

The absolute and total infallible logic seems to escape some people who say "I'm a pvper and I want x,y,z to attract non pvpers into zones"

After lots of debate on that thread, and some good idea's here too, I am left with these personal conclusions:

1. PvP is only viable with a fraction of the available sets. Boring.
2. PvPis only viable with highly specialised builds that gimp you in PvE (at least team PvE). Boring and destroys my main interest.
3. PvP is horribly uneven even under these circumstances. You have to farm for hours to be viable. Boring.
4. When I have entered PvP there is, to my mind, much less skill than people bleat on about it. I dont do it much but I have mastered the basics pretty quickly. Keep moving, hop,skip, jump, breakfrees when mezzed, mez, blast, debuff opponents. buff allies. I just dont beleive there is a steep learning curve. What there is, is a requirement to have a totally streamlined cookie cutter build and farm for hours and hours to uberize it. To my mind the skill component, whilst there, is overplayed and mythologised.
5. PvP *could* be great fun, and is a good component to overall health and interest in the game.


At the moment its just boring at best, always limited to exactly same builds, play, sets, and rude/obnoxious at worst.

Usually.

The only good times I have had are a) occassionally with freinds. and b) test server mash up events on zones.

There are, I think, two ways forward:

1. Invest no more resources at all in PvP. By all means let the uber1337 killers enjoy the zone. But they will be a tiny minority and wont have easy prey in the zones.

2. Invest large quantities of resources and totally think outside the box (PvPvE for instance).

What I dont think is acceptable is the dev's investing moderate amount of resources into sticky tape solutions that dont attract more than trivial amounts of people to allready ghost zones. If they are going to do something about PvP it has to be a huge radical rework.

Personally i'd leave it to die and wither, but im not sure thats good for the game. At some point they need to do option 2.

As far as I can see the only way you are ever going to get any solution is a PvPvE type scenario:

e.g. Each team spawns on a map / mission with 2 lts and a boss type NPC comrades per team member (Say longbow or Arachnos soldiers). There is no respawning. Once all enemy and minions are dead, that team wins.

Whats different about this?

1. AoE Powers will be useful.
2. Mez Powers cant be broke free from instantly by minions.i.e. useful.
3. Mellee toons can attack the minions.
4. Running away means you leave behind the minions, they get wiped. Travel powers dont pwnz everything.
5. Placed powers like EQ have a function, Sure, run out of them. your minions wont.
5. Phase Shift. See 4.
6. Uberization is, whilst still there, minimised. The presence of minions causes an "averaging" effect on total DPS/Protection/Whatever.

See how many problems this solves.

A man can dream.

Personally, Id rather spend2 hours doing a fun task force with nice people than 30 mins with mindlessly repetative farming in the company of people who like to farm.

Interesting stuff. Im certainly going to take a look at my Earth Controller again. I havent slotted earthquke for damage procs and I strongly suspect that "tics" a lot faster than Quicksand.

Im not a farmer (actually, very militantly antifarming) so i cant comment there, and will never attempt to do so.

Even so, good suggestions there. Time fora dust off and respec!

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

we wont know. but it does seem to be nerfing season now.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you ignore all the buffs, yes.

[/ QUOTE ]

Interesting thread stateside. Buffs > Nerfs.

So the devs are very bad indeed. buffs and nerfs should be equal.

Or,playing devils advocate to a game that is allready verging on too easy, nerfs > Buffs.

Oh i like Quicksand as a power,dont get me wrong. I just dont see much damage from the procs. Its noticible, just rather lacklustre IMO.

EDIT: I am beginning to suspect the key thing here is the tick ratel i wonder if it is slow for QS but higher for EQ?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Pretty close thing IMO. Especially if you discount the AoE hold power (hardly spammable).

[/ QUOTE ]

Thats the problem with Grav the immobs and the single target hold are the only things spammable where as Earth its all 1 shot AoE's that will tick the dmg over time but if you can lay afew of those AoE's down it soon mounts up then you have your spammable powers for extra dmg.
If you herd and use those AoE's things die very quickly.
Its a balance between crowd control,safety and dmg everything which Grav lacks.

[/ QUOTE ]

Id have to say thats completely contrary to my experience. I have a level 50 Grav troller and a level 38 erth controller.

Earth easily outperforms in terms of crowd control. I imagine in *potentially* outperforms in terms of AoE damage with enough procs. Although, for instance, my earth controllwers quicksand is proc'd for damage and i am not impressed.

But in terms of ST damage and control Grav is simply streets ahead. Propel gives Grav the best ST damage of any controller, end of story. In addition, the quickly spammable lift gives more ST control than Earth. Lastly, Singularity gives the most control of any pet (and if you use its repel aura correctly, LOT of safety).

In a big team, id go with earth, no question.

Solo, Id take Grav any day of the weak. It leaves Earth trailing.

Now the only difference I can see is that you have slotted earthquake for damage procs (fair enough, Im going to do that too, but its not perma - i work out its something like verge 35 damage per tic with both procs) and that you have one more proc in AoE immobilise. But I cant see that compensating for Propels ST attack chain, myself.

Gravity (excluding purples)

Crushing Feild: 2
Lift: 1
Gravity Distortion: 2
Crushing Feild: 3
Propel: 1
Gravity DIstortion Feild: 1
Wormhole: 1
Singulrity: 1

Total: 12

Pretty close thing IMO. Especially if you discount the AoE hold power (hardly spammable).

Ah,I presume then that Mid's is in error and the immobs / holds etc can be slotted with -def debuff Ios

I must be missing a trick here... I played around with Mid's, and I couldnt get more than 7 damage procs. Admittedly, I wasnt counting purples, or stoney.

Sonic does more -res than Rad.

I do understand, beleive me. But I still draw your attention to the fact that you are using /storm as secondary (high damage, -res debuffs, and full of proc potential) which REALLY skews the impression, and that most of the proc's will be in earths AoE.

There is a world of difference between the output of something like Earth / Storm and Earth / Empathy.

And then look at the potential of other sets. For instance, Gravs AoE immobilise will have procability for immobilise, damage, and slow. Arctic Air can fit in confuse and slow procs in a huge AoE toggle. Fire will leave Earth trailing even without procs.

I dont dispute Earth CAN do reasonable damage, very particularly with a "damagy" secondary like Storm, Kin, maybe Sonic or TA, but out of the box its the weakest damage primary in my book (made up for its strongest control)

PS how many Procs do you count in earth? Looking at pure damage, and exluding purples (perhaps unfair of me), I count 7 damage procs, one of which will be in Volcanic Gasses, hardly "spammable".

EDIT: I humbly submit that Grav has at least "close" to the amount of procs, due to its slow and KB effects.

I dont have experience ona defender, only on a /TA mastermind. IMO it could do with a little love, but play to its strengths...

TA is low endurance. Effectively meaning you save slots and can blast / use leadership pools. Compare it to Radiation for instance, which gobbles up blue stuff.

TA works when you are detoggled. Especially at high levels this is a big bonus. The rad defender gets mezzed, the debuffs drops, and the house of cards can all apart. Not such a problem for you.

TA is DAMAGE. Its actually less of a "defence debuff" set than a set that boosts your teams damage. TWO -res powers, a -def power, and the sick damage of oil slick arrow. Its the biggest "damage booster" set after Kinetics, and offers a lot more "protection" than kin.

TA is HUGE. With the exception of tangle, ice, and (to a degree) Acid arrow, TA is all about HUGE AOE. Its the most AoE of the lot. Hence, it works best in BIG teams. It dosent need technical herding or crowding (which to my mind is both slow and boring). TA is reliable.

Just my thoughts.

I would like to see Poison Gas Arrow get -regen debuff (since it is the weakest in the set, and TA really needs some love against AV's.... it'snot favoured on the hard TF's, and it should be on an even par), Perhaps boost the debuffs of entangle arrow and flash arrow (just generally too weak), but otherwise its a happy set!

I understand where you are coming from... it is possible to do much better damage from earth/ with the use of proc's in things like quicksand, earthquake, immob, etc. However, its *also* possible to boost damage in other sets in a similar way.

Also, in fairness, /Storm is probably the highest damage secondary set you can get (maybe trick archery pips it to the post).

Even fully proc'd out (and my troller is half proced out so I wouldnt know), its damage always felt the least to me. Its not *unmanagable* - i can solo on it, but compared to other primaries it has always felt the worst. Not terrible, but the worst.

My damage order of primaries feels like:

Plant*, Fire, Grav, Illusion, Ice, Earth,

Mind is ? not sure where to put it due to lack of pet

Plant is technically first due to Seeds of Confusion - gives the most damage to enemies, although of course at a slight xp loss.

Just my feelings,anyway.

[ QUOTE ]
Awesome build!
I can see now why there are so many Fire/kins around... the sheer brute force of that build is mindblowing!

[/ QUOTE ]

For now. Guess who has a big "nerf me" target painted on their forehead?

[ QUOTE ]

It sounds like the morality was clearly signposted, so there was no dnager of the game "tricking" you into being good or evil.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think modern thinking is that morality is based on intent rather than objective "goodness" of action.

But clearly things could get very complicated.

\/\/hi @ll t3h n3rf1ng lol11!1!11, J00 d3vs r t3h suxX0r. buff t3h 3v3ryth1ng d3n w3 r t3h @ll h4ppy! h00 c4r3es if t3h g4m3 g3ts t3h st00p1d EZ lol111!11!11

Its been suggested many times before. My own feeling is that metal armour is to close to Invulnerability to be worth it. There just isn't a "hook" in the above set to make it interesting or novel to play.

Im not saying its bad, its just there are more novel concepts out there which would add more to the game (adaptive armour, reflective effects, absorbtion etc)

On the flip side, DImension Shift is probably the best rescue power in the game when a team gets over its head.

This set was proposed somme time ago under the name "Telepathy", basically a Mental buff / debuff set.

The powers were fairly different, but the idea is the same.. it allows "fully mental" Defenders and Controllers, possibly Corruptors if they get psi blast at some point, and importantly allows that concept "Mental domination" mastermind.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
2 days time limit - not 48 hours realtime, but 48 hours game time - plenty of time to farm a mission and plenty of time to finish one. Not that I want a time limit on all missions, but if it had to be done, I'd want something like this.

[/ QUOTE ]And when you have several alts you only play once every few months?

[/ QUOTE ]

Then every few months you would fail a mission. If you decided to pick a mission just before you log off. Which would be odd, but hardly game breaking.

[ QUOTE ]
2 days time limit - not 48 hours realtime, but 48 hours game time - plenty of time to farm a mission and plenty of time to finish one. Not that I want a time limit on all missions, but if it had to be done, I'd want something like this.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thats what I was thinking. More like a week though.

There really isnt any legitimate reason for having a mission up for more than a week unless its for farming.