Comicsluvr

I once played on a superteam of TA/Archery Defenders. Wow is all I can say. We had a system down pat after about lvl 12 and moved like a medieval spec ops unit. Fun too because there was always something to shoot at as opposed to having a bunch of passive toggles on.

You can go the boring, traditional route like FF or Sonic. Stacked Def and Resist is always good. I'd be eager to see something new like Electric/Red Trollers.

1) 8x AM plus Hasten is perma-Hasten for everyone easily. Also tremendous End recovery

2) 8x Conductive Aura means NO End for the enemy ever

3) 8x Paralyzing Blast means that you can alternate them on spawns and with the high +Recharge pretty much lock down anything Boss or under every time.

4) 16 Gremlins...'nuff said!

5) Staggered Lingering Radiation means floored Regen and -75% Rech for the target all the time.

6) 8x RI and EF takes care of even the toughest AVs and would be overkill on anything else.

Damn...now I want to play on one of these lol!

So many choices! Thanks gang! Now to see what sort of concepts I can come up with...

Wow CBeet...nice build. I would not have thought of combining those two.

After alternating between solo and teaming for a while I find myself swinging back towards teaming again. However I'm looking for a really solid support toon and I'm not that experienced with them. Builds on Mids are nice but they don't really reflect how useful this or that power can be on a team. I need help picking a good AT and Powersets but I have a few caveats:

1) No Empathy. I ran an Emp Defender to lvl 30 after which he withered on the vine because everyone believed that ANY other type of character would be more useful. Also it's dull.

2) No Kins because everyone ELSE seems to want to run them.

3) Aside from the occasional Tip mission or the SSA I NEVER plan on soloing with this guy so he doesn't need to be great solo. But I DO want a combination of AT/Power sets that will really benefit the team.

4) I've been around long enough to realize that debuffing the enemy IS buffing the team so I'm not fussy about Defenders vs Controllers or buffs vs debuffs.

Thanks in advance for the help.

I don't like the way teleport works now for several reasons:

1) Lengthy animation times. Seriously, this is a travel power. The fact that is can be used to deliver an attack vie porting into a mob is a side-effect, not some benefit there should be trade-offs paid for.

2) The End cost is horrendous. No other travel power can burn you OUT of End with typical use. Yes, it's faster but not THAT much faster.

3) The interface is clunky, keybinds and all. Btw if you need a special keybind to make a power work well then the power is flat-out badly designed. My primary problem with this is the fact that Teleport always takes you to the maximum range or to the target point but no place in between. If you could mid-air port with the use of the scroll wheel it would improve the power greatly IMHO.

The Teleport Pool has some good utility but truth be told I like most of the utility powers more than I like using Teleport itself.

As a big fan of the old Saturday Morning cartoons, I could see this working but not with the traditional circus clown theme. You'd have to go over the top with BIG hammers, pies to the face, all the stuff we liked to laugh at. I can see a set that would be hilarious to just sit and watch. If you leave out the creepy clown aspect then you get no worries about DC getting upset about the Joker.

I just don't think enough players would paly it. Most players, IMHO, are thinking more of creepy clowns which would be easy to do as a set but not nearly as much fun to watch or play. They might also stray too close to the Joker to make the Legal Dept comfortable.

In the end I think that the idea is sound but that the application would be too tough to be worth the effort.

Some good ideas here I think. Personally I'd prefer they change the controls/AI before rebalancing the sets but bird in the hand and all that.

My biggest thing about MMs is I don't like the Minion-Lt-Boss paradigm over and over again. I like that the Lich is more support while the Assbot is pure attack. Keeps them all from being reskinned versions of each other. With this in mind I'd like to see Mercs try using the Spec-Ops as their Tank.

I can see the Spec Ops as having ALL the controls and debuffs for the set. Working together, the two of them could entangle, gas and generally run enemies crazy. For example:

Having two pets with a bad snipe is never a good idea unless their AI can handle the attack chain which Spec Ops can't. Take it out entirely. Replace it with a short-range wide cone with moderate recharge and -Recharge on the enemy (their silenced guns strike unseen, confusing targets and reducing their effectiveness).

Give the Web Grenade a small change to Hold and allow it to be slotted as such. Against a tough single target their spammed grenades would be more effective.

Give them higher Defense (from their stealth) so that when they DO attract all this extra attention they can survive it.

I like the idea of controlling the different tiers of pets separately. I can see sending in the Spec Ops ahead of the rest of the horde where they use Smoke on the enemy before lobbing in tear gas and THEN firing away. The mob shoots at them, misses hopefully due to the -To Hit and added Defense, then the rest of the Horde opens up with everything. You could even add a higher Taunt factor to the Spec Op's shots to draw more attention.

I like the idea of moving the grenades to the two Minions as well.

I have more ideas for MM Primaries than air to breathe but reading up-thread as someone said: I'd like them to fix what we have first before giving us any more broken crap. However, assuming that's done:

1) An elemental set. However the four basic elements don't lend themselves to 6 minions so we use earth, wind, water, fire, Mind and the Boss is an amalgam creature called the Gaia.

2) Arachnos spiders. The animations are all done already...just need to code them to obey...or not as most pets are wont to do...

3) I like the celestial/angel idea as a perfect counterpoint to Demons. Needs a good secondary though...

4) The medieval set is nice too but it might look a bit too much like Zombies only alive. Staff and Bow for the Minions, Knights for the Lts and a wizard for the Boss works really well it seems. I liked the idea of one Knight with sword and shield and the other with TW. Keeps them interesting.

5) Subterranean creatures might be interesting. 3 Morlocks, 2 hybrid Morlock/monster hybrids and the Boss would be animated magma.

6) Shadow Beasts. 3 Imp-like minions, 2 Shades and one Umbral Beast with less howling/barking.

7) Illusion/Mind is a good idea too IMHO. All the summoned critters are mental constructs of some kind. Minions could be ranged, Lts melee and the Boss would be called a Nightmare and be some terrible monster.

But as I said...no more new stuff until existing stuff gets fixed...

I used to take it on my SS Tank specifically to have something to use during Rage crash. I'd slot it with 3 Perfect Zingers (including the proc) for the +Regen, the Triumphant Insult proc and the Explosive Strike and Force Feedback procs. If the damage procs hit they aren't affected by the -Dmg from Rage and it cleared baddies away from squishies that are nearby.

However it turned out to be more trouble than it was worth in the long run. I don't take Unstoppable any more because it's too situational. Hand Clap is the same way. If the Devs made it KD (never gonna happen...with Stomp SS is the best Melee set out there) I'd be all over it even without damage.

As it is it fits firmly in the 'skippable' column for me.

I'm an objective guy with too much time so I ran some numbers from Mid's and got the following results:

1) The WORST T1 Tanker Secondary is from Super Strength at 30 dpa. That's a full 7 worse than the next highest and nearly half of the best. Staff does 37 which is pretty middle of the road.

2) The T2 from Staff is pretty middle of the road at 58 dpa. Better than some, worse than others.

3) Staff is ALL Smashing damage where most of the other sets have whole or partial damage from other classes. Is it possible that enemies are more resistant to pure Smashing at 50+?

It's late so that's all I got for now. Good luck though.

I agree...if your plan is Hover-Blasting then Bonfire, Hot Feet, Combustion and Blazing Aura are not going to do much but burn End. I would remove them, add slots to your Armor and self-Rez (if you die a lot, die near the enemy then explode to get them back tee hee!). I would also get Flares back as your other 'Oh crap I'm Mezzed!' power.

I can handle that. Certainly there would have to be benefits to each choice but as I said if someone wanted to do ST versus AoE then they could do so.

The main reason I came up with this idea is that almost every build I see is 75% the same by 50. I mean you get 24 Power choices and even if you take EVERY Primary and Secondary (and many of us don't) then you have 6 choices left. Movement Power? Ok. five left. You like Hover too? Ok...4 left. Many people dip into the Pools at this point (I don't think I have a build without CJ). But many sets have 1, 2 or more powers deemed 'skippable' by many. Thus most of the ATs you see will be built the same. They HAVE to be because there aren't enough choices.

But this way you still get 24 Powers but now not everyone will be boxed into the SAME choices. If we had 4 more Primary Powers and four more Secondary Powers per set that would add so many new permutations it would almost be like having new sets without as much work.

This is totally off the cuff so bear with me if it's rough.

We all like the idea of new power sets. We like making up new toons and trying to figure out the coolest way to defeat Lord Whoever with different combinations of powers and ATs.

Now how about the Devs scratch that creative itch we seem to have without having to create whole new sets or totally remaking old ones? What if they gave us more than one Power choice per tier?

Hear me out before reaching for the butterfly nets and torches. Let's say that I want to build a Fire/Fire Blaster but I prefer ST attacks. Fire/ is loaded with AoEs and I might be hard-pressed to fill all my Power choices with just ST attacks without gimping the character. So what if the Devs made up alternate choices for some of the even levels where we pick Powers?

For example: An alternate choice for Fire Ball might be Fire Burst, similar to Fire Blast but with more DoT or something. As I said, the idea is very rough. However, I like choices and this would give us a whole slew of new, possible combinations without who new sets needing to be invented.

While I concur that TA needs some love I don't believe the situation is as dire as the OP thinks.

1) There is no way the Devs will increase the values on Entangling Arrow by 50%. And why trade off the Acc bonus and actually raise the End cost? Once we've been given a bonus don't trade it away. The values on the debuffs are fine as they are. However I would raise the duration to 22s to match the Immob duration.

2) Flash Arrow is already good as you said.

3) I agree that Glue Arrow, a must-have for the set, needs upgraded. However a 2% chance at anything is meaningless and not worth the coding time. Also, the 60' range on the power makes it necessary to get closer to the enemy than I like. I would make the Hold chance 10% and increase the range to 80'

4) I agree with you on Ice Arrow. I would increase the debuffs to the 25% that you mentioned and I would also add a small DoT like the Hold in the Ice set.

5) Poison Gas arrow is pretty good as-is. As with Glue Arrow, I would raise the range to 80' but I would make the Sleep a field like Static Field is so enemies caught in it have a further chance to be affected if they wake up.

6) I agree that Acid Arrow needs a bigger radius. 8' is not reliable enough for a set that relies on debuffs. 15' would be much more appropriate however I would no increase the Recharge time.

7) Disruption Arrow costs too much End I agree. As a matter of fact your analysis of the power was spot on except for the part about more than 10 targets. I'm not one of those guys who asks the Tank to herd all the time so it's rare that I even see more than 10 mobs in a spawn. Increasing it to 16 seems excessive to me. Right on with the rest though, especially the - to hit

8) What is the radius of Oil Slick? Mids has it at 5' and I KNOW that's wrong.

9) I would remove the -Recovery part of EMP Arrow personally. Not all nukes have crashes and to be honest as good as the power is it certainly doesn't rate a crash IMHO

I have powers that I will take and only use solo because the timing to use them effectively on a team can be dodgy. Big KB comes like Gale are like this as well as DS. Plus, there is so much tasty with Grav now that I don't have a ton of extra slots to throw around like I used to.

On a tight team (one that plays together often) I can see this being part of a really sweet set-up routine. I DS the Boss, we all take down the spawn, drop DS and grease the lone survivor. Still, if I have it I won't use it if it'll be a problem.

None of this was a problem before GR came out. Each side had distinctive ATs with distinctive roles and that was that. Then with GR you have heroic Brutes and MMs and villianous Tanks and the lines got very blurry.

However I don't think that it will be easy to separate them again. With Inventions the Devs have made Scrappers and Brutes that can be as survivable as Tanks. Those two already did more damage so if they had to give up a small part of it to get as tough as Tanks they were still ahead of the curve. However Tanks are unable to lean the other way. They have nothing to sacrifice in order to gain more damage or control.

The game is supposed to be about having fun and making choices. The player can normally choose to have a more aggressive build or a more defensive one. Some STs and powerset combinations allow you to come close to having it all and those are the current FotW on the Forums.

I think ALL of the powersets and ATs need a leveling pass first before anyone goes mucking about. Bring the less advantageous sets (like Dual Pistols) up to be closer in performance to the high-end sets like Fire and Dark. Fix some of the issues like Nuke crashing and the highly-skippable T9 powers on many defensive sets. Update some of the oldest sets (like Stone Armor) to make them something other then 'I play until I get T9 then respec the whole character'.

THEN you can start playing about with the ATs and Inherents and so forth.

Any of the VEATs works well as a leader. You get your own buffs as well as the Leadership Pool for double the fun. Also, you can dual-build to adapt to your team. If there's no Tank around you can go melee-heavy and fill in. If the team needs fire support go for more ranged powers especially on a Widow or Crab.

Plus playing them alone is never dull after lvl 12...

I have played my SM/Regen to lvl 10 and my SM/EA to only 8 but both seem fun and highly survivable. The End Redux Form seems helpful when the End-hungry AoEs come on-line before DOs are available. Attack chain doesn't seem to need the +Rech but I imagine when the Web Grens hit I'll be going there. When I get DOs and End is less of a problem I'll be trying the +Dmg with the AoEs to make them even more awesome.

However the in-game info is wrong. I noticed that it has base damage for all of the attacks listed in the single digits.

I don't know whether the set will be giant-killer or not but it sure seems like fun to me.

The break-dance animation needs an alternative ASAP however. Worst part of the set from what I've seen so far...