EmperorSteele

She seems to be having problems standing up straight.

Not that I MIND this, mind you.

Where'd you get the Cloud/Sephiroth poster?

At a county fair from some Asian lady selling bootlegs and cheap knock-offs like 10 years ago. =D

I have a question. What is the point of having more than one monitor? Seems to be a common theme here. What do you use it for?

Looking up stuff online while i play a game, or when i need extra canvas space in photoshop, or if i wanna play a movie and websurf at the same time (multi tasking ftw)... i never thought I'd want or need two monitors, but once i actually had two usable ones.. well, ok, i don't use the second monitor like 80% of the time, but it's NICE when i do require it.

Thing with confused mobs is, they only have 50% ToHit, so they're not going to kill each other unless you sit back and do nothing. On a good team, the confused foes won't even have a chance to hurt one another.

It -does- make it a touch harder for tanks to grab stray agro, though (in case SoC misses a few targets), but that's the only tactical drawback i can think of.

Nice, M_B XD

Here's mine =)

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If the story doesn't have a theme, then what is the author saying with it? The answer has to be nothing. If that question does have an answer then there's your theme, but if the author isn't saying anything then what, exactly, about the story in question justifies the killing of even a single tree to produce the paper to print it? Generating suspense may sell books or movie tickets but it doesn't make a story into literature.

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What about sit-coms? None of them have a theme, they simply have characters who are put into situations for our amusement. Heck, most tv dramas could be considered the same thing. Heck-again, one could argue that the entirety of real life is Just A Bunch Of Stuff That Happens. So i think using it as a -2 star penalty might be a bit over-doing it?

Not reading 7 pages, just wanted to say:

Second one looks a LOT like the FF7 logo. =P

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I've had several purple drops in my day. None of them have came from a boss. Mostly minions and lieu.

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That's because you also fight more minions and lts.

Well, the 30's are the leveling hump, when it takes noticeably more bad guys and mission completes to get to the next level then previously. Make sure you have some buffs, and team more often. Otherwise, just indulge the vast amount of content in the 30s and enjoy the ride. Because once you get to 50, there's not a lot else to do.

Of course, if you're having difficulty because you're dying more often or mobs are taking longer to kill while soloing, then yeah, there may be a way to tweak your build. Post what you got (using Mid's Hero Planner) and we'll figure something out =)

EPICS

Ecto Plasmic Insular Containment Suit

SUIT

Self Uncorporal Integration Textile

NERD

Negative Energy Recomposition Device

.... got nuttin' else.

Personally, I don't care much about the MC vs SoC debate. With the other tools in Mind, MC doesn't need to be used as much or anything, so i figure, on it's own, it's fine as-is. MY big concern is Total Dom.

Though i just want more readily-available containment so i can haz moar damage.

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I don't think Mind's soloability is at issue. I can solo using nothing more than MH, Dom, Mes and Lev and never touch my secondary. Mind is decent on a team up to 3-4 players. However, on a team of 8 it is measurably weaker than many sets, relying heavily on Terrify for AoE control.

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You know I just cannot disagree more strongly. I have done many full group TF's across a whole span of levels and many times as the only controlling hero on the team. I have never ever had any problems constantly locking down full groups of mobs and am always the backbone of every team. I just can't disagree enough with your statement! Mind Control has the most control of any set!

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Hmm, must be different team make ups then. Whenever I'm on a team, I don't even HAVE to control; people steamroll through stuff regardless of whether I hold things or not. Heck, a few times an entire mob went down in the time it took Total dom to ACTIVATE.

*shrug*

*low whistle* Damn Venture, you tryin' to make War Witch cry?

My thing is, I swore by TD over MH for a while... but i also leveled about as slow as grass would grow. "Okay, mass hold, defeat the foes... ok, gotta wait three minutes before engaging next mob... *pick up a book*"

Then IOs came out. TD is up far more often, stays active longer, and i've learned to chain MH (rather, cast Mass hyp, wait until it's recharged, then hit Terrify and MH again in quick succession). However, I've been discouraged by the fact that I've *had* to purple out just to get my controller working the way she probably OUGHT to *without* a permanent 80% recharge and accuracy boost. What about people just running SOs? I'm half tempted to use my second build to test SO-only utility vs IO'd out utility, but... Mweh, lazy.

Now the point of the original post isn't "make my purpled out toon more ubar!", it's "Bring this controller type up to a functionality that it ought to be at without investing in all the so-called optional extravagance, because that's the only way it actually WORKS and makes you feel like an actual HERO."

Psythe, what do you mean "Cottage rule" though? o_O

Actually, if fear/confuse gave containment, i have the feeling that the devs would then give the Cim traitors (and any similar subsequent mobs) resistance to those effects as well, thus making control -completely- useless. That, and then Mind would be way too OP XD

And yes, Mind is powerful at -control- however it still suffers from lower damage output (see: no second source of damage) and its controls not giving enough containment. MagicJ I think did a bunch of tests and found that while Mind performed very well pre 32, post 32 it falls to the bottom of the pack. I feel this needs to be addressed.

*ahem*

I am here before you today to propose changes to the Controller Primary known as Mind Control, or in layman's terms "The one without a pet". As a preface, adding a pet is not on my agenda, so don't worry. Anyways...

Mind, as it currently stands, is a good set. It can even be a great set in the hands of a competent player. However, there are some powers within the set that are problematic, and the set as a whole suffers from these problems, especially in comparison to other controller primaries.

Mind's biggest advantage is lots of ST damage and various mez types (sleep, KD/-fly, hold, confuse, afraid, and repel), as well as providing a damage type that isn't too highly resisted anywhere except late in the game. However, the problems I will address below take away from this advantage, and I hope that my proposed fixes help Mind become more like the "blastroller" set it's apparently designed to be.

The first big problem is the lack of a reliable containment setting AoE. Mass Confusion doesn't provide Containment. Mass Hypnosis breaks after hitting a foe once. Total Domination has a very short duration, a very long recharge, lousy accuracy and agros foes that it misses, making it unreliable. Terrify also doesn't set up containment. TK can be used, but it shoves your foes away from you, and even spreads them out, making it unreliable in open areas. Most other Controller sets have a reliable, containment-setting AoE. Mind does not.

The second "issue" (i refuse to call it a problem) is the lack of a pet. When soloing, you have nothing to use your secondary buffs on. While Mass Confuse takes the role of a pet: redirecting agro and damaging the enemy group, using it can be problematic. Your only damage AoE will not only fail to do containment damage to a confused-only mob, but it will then scare them, making them stop attacking one another, and you're back to picking them off one by one. This makes soloing with a mind controller in the late 30s a bit harder by comparison, and has given the set overall a general negative stigma among the playerbase (it's a largely uninformed opinion, but how many times have we seen "i don't wanna play Mind, it doesn't have a pet"?). Mind should be made to be a better set to compensate for its post-32 weakness, and earn the respect it deserves.

After thinking it over, I've found that most of the powers in Mind are good as-is. However, they would probably need to be rebalanced in light of the proposed changes I'm making here today.

The first power on my hit list is Total Domination. Most powers are pretty good and useful out of the box, though a little weak. TD is none of the former and VERY of the latter. It's base numbers are 15 second duration, 60% accuracy, and takes 4 minutes to recharge, all for a whopping 26 end! In any other set, making this power better would be overpowered, but consider: Mind doesn't have a pet to wail on held baddies, you only have 1 AoE attack (2 if you pick one from your epic), oh, and did i mention that if TD misses anyone, they agro on you? And by the time you lock that foe down... oops, time's up!

That's assuming you don't 6-slot the power, which you HAVE to just to make it effective. If you use IOs (which the devs have repeatedly stated is not considered when balancing things) and have a secondary power to boost your recharge and hasten and Tactics, then this power is actually pretty good. But for a lot of people, that's a pretty big "if". A power should not be so lousy as to take 3 levels worth of slots and dependence on a self-buffing secondary to make it relevant!

In addition, the activation time is too long. I've seen, many times, where i have my foes scrambling below me, I go to hit TD to make them hold still... but in between the time i click the button and the power finally finishes activating and applies the mez, a bunch of AI read my mind and run away, don't get hit, then come back and continue shooting! (actually, it happens a lot with any AoE-dependant toon, but in this case it's infuriating).

Therefore, I propose the following: Make Total Dom Mind's "reliable AoE". In the interest of balance, i will also encourage some aspects of the power be nerfed, but the power will still be better overall.

Changes:

Make the base duration 22.5 seconds. Being able to enhance it to close to 45 seconds is not over-powered, but more fair for a soloing character. On large teams this doesn't matter anyway as most groups already perish before the current duration is up.

Increase base accuracy to 75%, and remove the agro penalty. To counter-balance this, reduce the max number of targets from 16 to 10, with a proc-like chance of 25% to hold up to 2 additional foes. It is very rare to find groups larger than 12, and in cases like that (an 8-man team), an AoE hold is wasted anyway as most groups get steamrolled by the 8-man team anyway. I am willing to trade effectiveness in 5% of situations for more effectiveness in 95% of situations. I'm sure most would agree.

Lower recharge to 2.5 minutes (150 seconds). Fully enhanced, you're still looking at 75 second recharge (which, given my proposed duration buff, still leaves a half minute of downtime). With hasten and, say, siphon speed, it might hit perma... however, balancing a power against other -possible- powers is unfair. Again, since a solo mind controller has no help dealing with groups of foes, it wouldn't be over-powered to allow them more safety, as well as a more steady supply of Containment. They still wouldn't be killing groups as fast as Fire or Plant or Illu users.

Decrease the activation time, but feel free to increase the animation and rooting times. Make the Controller LOOK like she's struggling to crush 10 minds at once, but not allow the foes to still act freely while it's happening.

Finally, with these mostly-buffs must come a cost: End cost, that is. 30-33 points of endurance should be used. That should help prevent people with huge amounts of recharge from spamming the power, as well as force them to slow down should they decide that Minds are now framing gawds.


Telekinesis This power is maligned, has limited usability, and is only mostly good as a "fun" power, finding little use in normal combat situations. It also sabotages itself, by pushing 4 of its 5 targets out of range! And only 5 targets? That's half the size of a normal mob on a decent sized team. All this does is get you in trouble. It's also useless against most EBs, AVs, and GMs as not only are they resistant to repel, but the hold in TK doesn't stack. Finally, even if one does get this power, there's no reason to place any slots in it. Making this power more powerful may open up reasons to add additional slots and force players to make some slotting sacrifices in other powers, which would encourage people to balance their characters better. Anyway:

Increase number of targets to 7 (or maybe more), based on having the End cost per second reflect the number of targets currently being held (ala repel or deflection bubble... say .75 end/foe/second). Along with this, reduce the severity of the "spread"; foes should stay relatively where they started in relation to one another, and only spread out gradually.

Let the hold mag stack with other holds (though maybe lower it to 2). All other Controllers have pets to help them belt out damage against AVs, so that they are still useful in the fight. Mind just has its own attacks which, thanks to lack of Containment, don't do much. This would help break through mez protection and enact containment, allowing the Mind Controller to contribute more during such fights (as opposed to being essentially a gimped Corruptor). This gives TK a use where before it had none.

Finally (and this is bound to be controversial), maybe add a damage component to TK. This adds more utility to the power, depending on how this is enacted. I have a few different ideas:

* TK deals a small amount of -unenhanceable- damage to the main target when it's first activated (like say, just under what Mesmerize or dominate does). Personally, i'd love to see the damage only apply once a foe hits a wall, but I have a feeling that is beyond the scope of the Co* engine.

-or-

* TK does a very tiny amount of damage over time. Like, does just over a minion's amount of regen (thus, you can kill a minon with TK... it would just take a while). Can be applied to all TKd foes, given that the end cost is now balanced around how many foes are held.

-or-

*Enhanceable damage in either of the two above scenarios, but then the power would need to have its auto-hit component removed and rely on accuracy enhancements. Also, damage would have to be very low, unless TK damage is not buffed by containment.

-or-

*Increase the damage in the first two scenarios, but have it be completely unenhanceable by buffs, inspirations, or even debuffs on foes. One flat number to hurt them all.

-OR-

*Some people might not WANT damage in TK. Therefore, I propose this: Upon selecting the power, the player is given an Enhancement Proc that they can choose to slot into the power that would have one of the first two effects (either the small burst damage or the DoT, Dev's choice). This proc would not work in any other power. Once placed, it cannot be removed by slotting something in it's place: a respec must be used. Would be allowed to be traded on the market (in case some goofball decides they don't want it, but then changes their mind, no pun intended).

That is all. Reworking 2 powers that would make the set go from good to great, yet it still wouldn't be too over-powered. Obviously the numbers would have to be re-crunched, applied, and tested before i could truly make that claim, but I'm willing to be proven wrong if it comes to that =)


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Suggestions, comments, etc, before i decide to bug Castle with this?

As for the "all at once when you enter", are the NPCs "single" hostages/allies by any chance? Because setting them at single doesn't actually make them guarded by 0 enemies: it sets the enemies then kills the foes, freeing the hostage. They then follow their coded instructions (chat, clue, etc) accordingly.

Dunno about the second situation =/

Well, the thing about this is, 4 of the 6 required badges are exploration badges. Another is a story arc which i don't think has any EBs (and you can now flashback to it, making accessing the arc easy). Then one challenging badge, the 200 PPs, which can be gotten easily by going through certain missions or street-sweeping in certain zones.

Compare to Geas or Archmage, which you need a lot more defeats for (Illusionist, anyone?). And vanguard, while not requiring difficult defeats, requires a TON. Not difficult, just time-consuming, unless you want the badge at like level 30.

That said, 25 minutes is still too long a recharge, and the effect itself is underwhelming. Here's what I'd do with it:

~55 damage (@ level 50)
Acc: x1.5
Mag 3 immob for 20 seconds
-20% recharge on target for 20 seconds
-20% runspeed/jump hight/flight speed for 20 seconds
6.5 minute recharge
end cost: 4.5

that way, you can use it once in a while, and it'll be worthwhile, but you still wouldn't find anyone relying on it as part of an attack chain.

About the ranged powers: they're powerful because the Ai don't use them that often. I had an ally speed boosted and he only threw out his ranged power about once every thirty seconds. Also, there's the case where it's the only attack available to them (ie, you're flying and they cannot), then having the powers be too weak would negate the threat.

Make it weaker for minions, sure, but i don't expect a boss to hit me for 10 points of damage and that's all they can do.

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Thats...it? If you look at any of the previous 14 issues, this is crap. Some new faces, more options for Ma which is primarily used for aoe farmign anyway, so who cares. And nothing for the colossal LACK of pvp in this game now. Oh, and another TF......



Completely unimpressed.

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Kind of skipped over in patch notes: Arena badges are GO! =D

Sounds like the clockwork were responsible =P

The problem was that, with MA specifically, people were using the system in ways that hampered other people's ability to use it as intended. See, here's how:

If one wanted to get the "free 500 hostages" badge, it would be TOO EASY to make a mission with 50 hostages set to "single", who would all get free the moment you entered the mission. And then add 50 glowies with 1 second duration just for fun. Make every enemy on the map an ALLIED patrol so you wouldn't get ganked while running around.

All the while, this arc is PUBILISHED. Now, that's not horrible, but multiply one doing this times a thousand (assuming just one thousand players were making farm missions). Suddenly, that's a very significant amount of missions that's clogging up the database and making it harder for people to find genuine content!

Then factor in people who bribed others to mark their mission 5 stars just to get to the top (or get the badges for themselves), even though their mission probably doesn't deserve it. That means you and I get annoying tells from these people asking to trade votes (happened a lot in the early weeks of I14), and then, people who worked hard on their mission (but aren't willing to vote-swap or anything) don't get any votes because nobody can find their mission.

All that, plus the so-called vote-cartels running around and down-voting every 5 star arc they could find just so they and their friends can get to the top, and that means many people's badge-attaining abilities were now out of their own hands. This game does have PvP badges, but none of the AE badges were supposed to be gotten or denied by a PvP mindset.

So there you go. This change was ultimately to equalize badge-gaining opportunities while discouraging publishing arcs just for xp/badge grinding. There's still work to be done, but don't take this all as a bad thing.

Mind is pretty good: it gives you a full single target attack chain using a damage type that isn't widely resisted. If you're willing to IO out, Total Domination can be made to be the best hold in PvP: Base 8 second hold, enhanceable to 16. With hasten and enough bonuses you can have it recharged in about a minute, letting you use it often.

just my 2 inf

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Get a total of 7 powers, 7. No more, no less

Enjoy


JJ

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and that's different from the 8 powers in guild wars, or the 10 here (yeah yeah, you have 10 trays, but I doubt anyone uses them all...I use 3 at most, and even they aren't filled)

People just want to find one little thing and complain about it, no matter how silly it is.

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Only 10? Are you mental? We get 26 (i think?), not counting temps, vet rewards and accolades.

It looks like he lowballed on recipes then vendored them. That would be why he has bids on glimpse of the abyss, i would think.

... wtf kind of black market are you running where you're selling people's pancr-...

Oh, wait, i misread that. Nevermind.