Daemodand

With the demise of CoH Podcast, it's good to see someone step into the void so quickly. I was expecting it to be a long time before anyone took up the mantle of CoX podcaster post CoHP.

CoHP was a quality podcast, so they're going to be one tough act to follow. Good luck with the new show.

Subscribed.

P.S. Here's hoping you're more open to redside play than the previous podcast (that was one of that show's few flaws). CoHP was downright redsidephobic.

Did you do Kalinda's missions? You'll sometimes have to clear some of those out before she'll offer you the cape mission.

The life of a mad scientist is not an easy one. Your creations going awry is the norm, not the exception. Call it "Dr. Frankenstein Syndrome".

Are you looking to stay a Blood Widow or are you branching to Fortunata or Night Widow?

Once your 50 is swimming in Inf', there's no reason in the world to be patient when you could be having fun with your new enhancements instead. 500K for a piece of common salvage is absolutely nothing when it means you can have that enhancement now and go play as opposed to waiting, even as short a time as 5 minutes.

Patience pays when you're poor. Once you're rich you can afford to be impatient. Literally.

Inf' is play money. Treat it as such.

Poison is a "natural" for Mutation or Science. Look at the animations: you spit, barf and toss the poison from within your own body. It's a very Mutant/Science feeling set.

Personally I made my Thugs/Poison a Science Origin hyper-intelligent gorilla. All the spitting and flinging goes perfectly with the ape theme.

I'd just like to point out that MA beats out Broadsword on single target sustained damage.* It has this reputation for being a pretty, no-damage set, but nothing could be further from the truth. Though it is pretty, it has plenty of damage to go with it.

*SOURCE

OK very good explanations, I think I can put this bailiwick down now.

One thing that bugs me though is that Conditioning practically demands you take Health and Stamina, due to the above-explained synergy of the power, and at the same time isn't strong enough to allow you to even think about skipping them.

I would have preferred something strong enough to allow you to go with a Staminaless build instead, but that's personal preference. The Fitness pool is just a requirement for anyone who wants to perform above a certain level (ie, not rest after every spawn) and doesn't get access to Quick Recovery: VEATs being especially well-advised to take Fitness since Conditioning has such good synergy with it.

VEATs are still great fun in any case. I'll just be sure to always take the Fitness pool with them (as usual for CoX) instead of chasing the Staminaless holy grail.

I say yes, it is worth checking out. Maybe you'll like it, maybe you won't. I say at least give it a try.

On Freedom Siren's is more balanced with smaller, more manageable battles going on than RV, and in that zone full IO sets are not at all necessary to be competitive (though you will eventually want them of course). You can go in there at 22 with SOs are do some damage.

If you are new to CoX PvP, you'll likely take more than your fair share of defeats at first. Do not give up! Practice, learn from your mistakes, and do a little bit better each time. Persist, and you'll get good.

Only one problem with that: an inherent that is little more than an empty placeholder is no inherent at all. This can and should be fixed.

All I can say is thank Recluse people are waking up to this. This is one of my pet bugs (along with Super Reflex's "Deflected" bug).

Several months ago I was experimenting on my Bane with Staminaless builds. VEATs get Conditioning so Stamina isn't as needed, right? Wrong!

I just couldn't get the build to work no matter how much Endurance Reduction I used, so I looked into the real numbers on Recovery. The numbers didn't add up. Suspicious, I looked at other VEAT types, they didn't add up either. I looked at the vanilla Archetypes, their numbers all added up. Khelds, they added up.

There was something rotten in VEATmark!

I posted my findings on the forums, and one or two people believed me but most were dismissive, thinking there was nothing strange about VEATs being the only Archetype with "missing" Recovery.

One thing's for certain though: Conditioning doesn't do anything. I'm convinced of that, and I hope it gets fixed.

Like I said, it's one of my pet bugs.

The best way to get a team is to make one.

I'm all about Banes and when it comes to PPPs, I agree Black Scorpion's Mace Mastery is hands down the best pick. Someone must've heard my desire for Banes to have even more offense, because Shatter Armor came along soon after, giving Banes two big hitters, and yet another source of -Res.

I think including IO procs, Banes are up to 6 sources of 20% -Res (Surveillance; Surveillance proc; Venom Grenade; Poisonous Ray proc; Crowd Control proc; Shatter Armor). That's truly fantastic.

Banes are far and away my favorite VEAT and one of my favorite Archetypes. Really, really nice!

Now if only Conditioning wasn't broken...

A_C is just alright with me!

I play SR in PvP all the time, and I'm telling you you are wrong. SR does not suck in PvP because people have lots of Accuracy, it sucks in PvP because people have lots of ToHit.

Stalkers are the best-case scenario for SR in PvP. Stalkers fair better with it than Brutes or Scrappers do. That's not to say it's really any good, though, just that Stalkers get a bit more out of it in PvP than those others do.

Ninjitsu, despite what some will have you believe, really isn't any good in PvP either. You've got a heal and...not much else of worth in PvP (except a bit of Psi Resist, for all the good that'll do you vs. Psi Blasters).

You want the "optimal" PvP experience on a Stalker? Regen and Willpower are the go-to secondaries. Meanwhile, I'll be playing SR because I'm just that nuts. And hey, I've killed Willpower Tanks on my Claws/SR so I'm not that bad.

As a percentage of population Brutes outnumber Tanks by quite a margin. When Blueside Brutes are possible, I expect they will outnumber Tanks as well. The reason being most people either find the Fury mini-game fun or don't mind it, and Brute secondaries can be buffed to Tanker levels for team play and Brutes are more solo friendly (especially in the early game).

Tankers will very much still have their place, and they have a dedicated fanbase. Generally, those who play Tanks right now will probably keep most if not all of their Tanks, and will make some Villain Tanks as well in all likelihood. The big questionmark here is how often will new players roll Tanks as opposed to Brutes? Most likely the answer will be "not often". The relative ease of the Brute's early game will help see to that (how many people try Tanks, only to delete them in the teens or early 20's? "Most of them" is a pretty safe guess.)

PvP will have a reverse dynamic. Brutes sans Fury and Tanks have very much the same damage in PvP, but Tanks are much hardier. Brutes can theoretically get more damage output but in practice this doesn't happen often given the nature of PvP. I see Villain Tanks outnumbering Villain Brutes in the PvP portion of the game to about the same degree Brutes will outnumber Tanks in PvE.

In summary, in PvE Brutes will outnumber Tanks, in PvP Tanks will outnumber Brutes, the current Tank fanbase isn't going away, but new players will generally choose Brutes over Tanks (there will be some new players who fall in love with Tanks, but they will be in the minority, and a good portion of those new players will likely have PvP in mind).

Freedom's under medium load as of this writing. Good job guys! That's the first time I've seen Freedom in yellow in...weeks if not months. Now come on and root for red!

Pop = good!

SS/SR gives a damage bonus...

...to your opponents.

Seriously though I will be running that combo when I get it up high enough (I don't PL so sue me). The uberness of SS combined with the wimpyness of PvP SR is so jarring, it's like PvP performance art.

And I'm taking Mako because there aren't enough Sharks in PvP these days, and due to theme.

Brutes do serve a really good purpose in zone PvP: often they are the only visible opponents, so they start absorbing blows and then this gives the Stalkers an opportunity to AS. It's a valuable, and greatly under-appreciated, role.

Take and six-slot Taunt. So many PvP Brutes don't, it's shameful.

I don't think anybody is going to be getting locked out of Freedom. Pop is too low for red. I'd like to be wrong about this, though! I'm rooting for red. Game needs pop. Game lacks pop.

I think Corruptors make out the best with the set. Scourge helps the damage when you need it most, and your secondaries help you survive for the length of time you'll need to kill anything.

Defenders I actually rank second with the set. The damage is quite subpar on this most dated of Archetypes, but your primaries keep you alive with no sweat for the lunar cycle you'll need to kill anything.

Blasters make out the worst. No Aim, no kind of upfront damage boost to take troublesome enemies out quickly, no support set to buy you the killing time you need, and a "nuke" that will probably kill you instead of your enemies. The set is bad business for Blasters.

I understand people are enthralled by the sights and sounds of the set (and they are sexy!) But this is no excuse for the set to be subpar on this level. It's Electric Armor all over again.

It's a weak set, there's no reason to take it on any Arch over anything else other than new sexy shininess, but Corruptors are your best-case scenario if you must roll it.

When the set is buffed (and it will be buffed) I will be justified in this. Just like with Electric Armor.