Entropic_Shift

Yeah, it works. Used it to save the team from multiple missile-spewing Titans when we entered a mish and got a massive ambush right then and there. Beat down the stuff in melee, then waltz out and work over the rest.

Mercs: Take M30. Slap 3x Centrioles in it, accuracy and proc to taste. You now have a pulling power that'll up your recharge, grab an entire spawn from 100'+ away, and has TRAVEL TIME. Makes pulling things into your traps a cakewalk.

Man, that ITF was a riot. Had a good time not having to look after non-MMs.

<< Combat Librarian

Yes, the pets can get sequestration rings. Can be bloody hard to sort out with all the effects going on. I generally peel the pets off the AVs every so often to visually confirm if they have rings or not.

On the plus side, every time I've managed to do this, I invariably get a better reward drop.

Finally got through one of these (thanks to the fine leadership of @Monocle Owl on Virtue) and on our run we tried a little something extra for the Lichen Infested War Walker.

The plan going in was to have everybody wail on the LIWW and for folks to keep an eye out for the regenerative lichens. This went well at first, until the adds rolled in and targeting became a mess.

What ended up fixing it was having one person use a $target league-chat macro whenever the lichen popped up. At that point, everyone reading league chat (heh-heh) could see that it was active and could easily click the name of the person in the league HUD to render a quick assist.

The effective result is that the LIWW would be under a hail of fire for the majority of the time, and then, pretty much as one, just about all the ranged characters in the fight would swivel and pop the lichen with a few of shots, downing it almost immediately.

Come to think of it, we ended up using that mechanic to plow down the bomb hallway without a hitch, too. It's a useful tool.

*shrug* It's a 'be prepared' thing. I usually run Tactics on my Necro/Dark for the set bonuses and to assist the Zombies, so I don't personally lose out much with 66% Acc. YMMV.

Grave Knights:

Try this slotting on for size.

2x Acc/Dam (Nucleolus) HOs
1x Lady Grey: Chance for Negative Damage
1x Achilles' Heel: Chance for -RES
1x Soulbound Allegiance: Chance for Build Up
1x Soulbound Allegiance: Damage/Endurance

66% Accuracy
94% Damage
33% EndRedux

All three procs, close-enough-to-cap-to-not-matter damage, and enough EndRedux to keep 'em going in the long fights. Same slotting works pretty well on Jounin, too.

I have a long-time 50 Ninja/Storm.

As long as you don't go totally berserk with the */Storm powers like Tornado or Hurricane or Gale, you'll be fine. Just knock stuff into a clump (or even a rough approximation thereof) and then let the Ninja go to work. Touch the clump every so often with Hurricane (gently!) to keep up the -toHit.

Of course, you can crank the volume to eleven if you want, you'll just kill a little slower.

You will always lose Genin, however. It's the rent you pay for such a flashy set combo. One well-aimed Fulcrum Shift, however, and the rent becomes worth it.

Glass Buzzsaws, my friend, Glass Buzzsaws.

In the spirit of the previous work done by Jibikao on Spec-Ops and Enforcers, I've got some Jounin numbers for you.

Methodology: Take one Jounin, upgrade fully, have it attack a Practice Dummy in RWZ while I monitor the pet combat channels to count attacks. Then take base damage listed for each attack power @ L50, multiply by 1.95 (for 95% damage enhancement from 3x L50 SOs), and tally up the enhanced results.

List format: <Attack Name>: <Number of> x <base damage> (enhanced damage) = <total raw enhanced damage>

Starting Jounin off right next to a dummy, attack for 60s:

Gambler's Cut: 9 x 25.70 (50.10) = 450.90
Sting of the Wasp: 6 x 35.48 (69.19) = 415.14
Soaring Dragon: 5 x 55.06 (107.37) = 536.85
Golden Dragonfly: 3 x 69.75 (136.01) = 408.03
Poison Dart: 1 x 37.50 (73.13) = 73.13
Placate: 2
Blinding Powder: 1

Total: 1,884.05

Starting Jounin from Poison Dart range, attack for 60s:

Gambler's Cut: 8 x 25.70 (50.10) = 400.80
Sting of the Wasp: 6 x 35.48 (69.19) = 415.14
Soaring Dragon: 4 x 55.06 (107.37) = 429.48
Golden Dragonfly: 3 x 69.75 (136.01) = 408.03
Poison Dart: 2 x 37.50 (73.13) = 146.26
Placate: 1
Blinding Powder: 1

Total: 1,799.71

In each case, Jounin threw 1x Caltrops during the 60s. Caltrops with 95% enhancement does 487.96 damage IF all 46 ticks land, which they would on a motionless target like the Practice Dummy. Since this doesn't happen very often in game, and Caltrops goes away when the target dies, its damage has not been included in these calculations.

If you wanted to guesstimate, though, Caltrops ticks once a second for 5.42 damage per tick. Every second the bad guy is alive, then, adds that much. It wouldn't be unreasonable to say that Caltrops lands 5-15 ticks of damage on average, so you could add ~25-75 damage to each total above.

Furthermore, Placate makes this a little harder to pin down, too. Sometimes it happens right before Gambler's Cut, sometimes right before Golden Dragonfly. To have a number to throw out there, take the average of those four melee attacks' damage and tack it on for every Placate that gets thrown: 90.67 damage.

With the fuzzy bits added on, you're looking at around 2,115-ish damage for melee-only, and about 1,940-ish damage for start-from-range Jounin.

I've not tried to factor in Smoke Flash, either. That's probably good for another couple-to-few-hundred damage, depending on how things worked out.

This is, of course, single-target, but this is what you get for Ninja fragility: A Can of Whoop-***.

(Enforcers averaged around ~1290 from Jibikao's results, and Spec-Ops were turning in around ~820. Just for comparison's sake.)

Bots/TA Mastermind--it's basically artillery. Disruption Arrow for a target designator, and then a horde of flaming missiles comes flying in. Cleanup to follow via a disco lightshow.

I went Core Musculature T4 for my Ninja/Storm. I throw around enough -def that the little guys hit consistently anyway, and the damage.... well, that's why I picked 'em.

I've had several L50 MMs over the years, and each combo does play differently. However, my control preference is pretty simple: place the pets such that their AI does a good job targeting and that their AoEs are useful.

Most exemplified by my Ninja/Storm. Use the Storm powers to move critters or keep them in place, at the same time sic'ing the Ninja on them. Result: a Big Ball of Violence.

Gave it a try last night with my Ninja/Storm. Was the first time I'd even been on the thing, so it was all new.

First thing I found out is that Ninja ARE fast enough on their feet to get out of the area of effect in time. I set 'em all to passive so that orders would take effect immediately or as soon as an animation finished. I was able to successfully dart them in and out to wail on Battle Maiden without losing any....

...so long as I could see the effects. First thing I'm doing next time I load that character is make an "Apex TF" costume with power coloration that won't obscure the little blue swirlies that show up before a sword comes down. Between the default-color storm effects plus other effects from the team, I missed the flames plenty of times, losing pets in the process. (The whole team noticed this, and a bunch of the SG are making non-obscuring "Apex TF" power colorations now)

All of those deaths were my own fault, though, so it didn't really bother me. I just had to pay better attention and not screw my own chances of seeing the things.

I'm fully expecting my Bots/TA and Mercs/Traps to fare a little better, being ranged, though I am expecting the animation times on the bots to result in their deaths sometimes.

All in all, I was a little unhappy that I lost so many pets this first run, but I saw how it all worked and having that info should make the next runs easier to do. I'll gladly take any of my other MMs into the fight in the future.

House of Razor-Edged Playing Cards: My Ninja/Storm Mastermind, Agent Ceiling Cat. Good solo, nice force-multiplier on small teams, does sick, sick things on a full team with support. Still drops in a heartbeat if I screw up, though, which makes it a fun one to play. Damage-capped auto-crit Golden Dragonfly makes it allll worth it.

Fire-Hose FrankenGun: My AR/Energy Blaster, Alex Petersen. Slotted for absolutely stupid amounts of range. For when I want to hang out, not worry about having or getting much team support, and still have fun blasting the snot out of things. And punching them, we can't forget the punching.

Adjust-a-Threat 9000: My Bots/Trick Arrow Mastermind, Sam Clarke. Able to contribute nicely with only her Assault Bot and her arrows, yet can pull out the full robot army when the Disco Show needs to get on the road. Stuns, sleeps, holds, slows, debuffs, and piles and piles of AoE, all adjustable as needed and applied at range. Perfect for when I want to work with a big team but am not in the mood to pull out a buffing character.

Murphy's Law of Combat, #27:

"When in doubt, empty the magazine."

AE System
--------
Welcome to Architect Entertainment -- Neutral
Death for Dollars! -- Neutral
Bare Knuckles of Rage (9304)
*

Character/Supergroup Origins
--------
Birth of a Fossil -- Heroic
Secret Origins(Tech) The Snake Women of Epsilon V (42221) - Heroic
Noah Reborn -- Heroic (2370)
Jumping in Feet First - Heroic - 1345
*

Classic Super-Hero/Super-Villain
--------
THE BOMBER --- Heroic --- 16607
In The Shadow of Statesman --Neutral--1160
*

Comedy
--------
The Extadine Lab -- Heroic
MacGuffin Delivery Service (1567) -- Villainous
ParaCon -- Heroic
The new and improved Lord Recluse Strike Force -- Villainous (though I wouldn't recommend against a hero )
The Fire Bunnies - Neutral, They are only bunnies after all...
You Say It's Your Birthday! (3630) - Neutral
Trademark Infringement -- Heroic (2220)
Hail to the King Neutral (34640)
Walk On the Wild Side - Neutral - 3580
Shirley You Jest (25474) -- Neutral
The Invasion of the Bikini Clad Samurai Vampiresses from Outer Space! - Heroic - 61013
Gnomish Madness (30204) - Heroic
*

Comedy/Drama
--------
A Super Team is Born -- Heroic
Cause of How Some Silly Stealed My Wings #1481 -- Neutral
How to Survive a Robot Uprising -- Heroic (12669)
Dr. Duplicate's Dastardly Dare -- Neutral
It's a Nice Day for a White Wedding (9059) -- Neutral
TURG FICTION: Ghost in the Machine, Act I - Heroic (althoughs romantic villains could try this too )
Rum Runners of Bloody Bay (3691) - Heroic
Have a Blap, Blap, Blappy Day Kids! (2019)
The Toypocalypse! (49280) - Heroic
*

Crime/Gangs
--------
The Bravuran Jobs -- Villainous (16809)
The Monstrous Regiment of Lesbian Hellions -- Heroic (27178)
Win the 2009 Freak-Lympics (2150) - Villainous
Ninja Crimewave! (2142) - Heroic
Whitehawks (Arc 49364) -- Heroic
The Internet is for Crime (53385) - Villains
Plastic Pistol Peril (1135) - Heroic*

Drama
--------
The Conciliators: Simone -- Heroic (4010)
The Fan Club -- Heroic
Of Mentors and Legacy - Heroic - 1589
*

Global Domination
--------
Axis and Allies -- Villainous (1379)
*

Heist
--------
Celebrity Kidnapping -- Villainous (1388)
Easy Money -- Villainous (31490)
*

Historical (Realistic)
--------
*

Historical (CoH Lore)
--------
The War on Superadine - The Regulators in their 1980's drug war (Heroic) (Arc 7959)
Origins - Volume 1 (57077) -- Heroic
*

Holiday
--------
*

Horror
--------
Astoria in D Minor (41565) -- Heroic
Dark Dreams (3615)
The Amulet of J'gara (1709) -- Heroic
Project: Perilous - Into the Chthonian Pit (#3586) - Neutral (Unless you happen to be a mad cultist, in which case, go nuts!)
Small Fears -- Heroic
*

Large-Scale Crisis
--------
A Hero's Halo -- Heroic
This Is War, Part I - the Revenge of Hro'Dtohz -- Neutral
Win the Past, Own the Future - Heroic
A Warrior's Friend - Heroic
The Clockwork War -- Heroic (18672)
Flight of the Valkyries - Precursor (20272) -- Neutral
*

Magic
--------
The Magical Miss Fitz (5079) -- Heroic
Chains of Blood (5492) -- Heroic
A Deal with Destiny -- Heroic
*

Military
--------
Redoubt Operations #1: Fires over Kalago -- Heroic
Red Storm Rising (Arc 4912) -- Heroic
Whitehawks (Arc 49364) -- Heroic
Axis and Allies -- Villainous (1379)

*
Misc. Adventure
--------
The Portal Bandits (3326) -- Heroic
*

Mystery
--------
Blowback (18575) -- Heroic
Dream Paper -- Heroic (13030)
Dream Paper 2: Restless Sleep -- Heroic (16797)
Dream Paper 3: Broken Dreams -- Heroic (13064)
*

Mythology
--------
Atlantis Attacks! -- Neutral (30898) -- Click for Promotional Poster
Anactoria's Descent Into the Underworld -- Villainous
The Seelie War -- Heroic
The Unseelie War -- Villainous
Tales of Cimerora, volume 1 : Of feathers and fur -- Heroic
The Aegis Affair - Heroic
Witches and Warriors (53006)- Heroic
The War of Fate(12220,46722)- Heroic
Rites of the Maenads (61159) - Heroic
*

Nemesis Plots
--------
Brass Reaver: Part 1 -- Neutral
*

Player-Chosen Outcome
--------
Hunting the Dark Dragon -- Heroic
Playing Gods -- Heroic (51106)
*

Sci-Fi
--------
Adventures of the Space Marines -- Neutral
Adventures of the Space Marines 2 -- Neutral
Above Mars - Part 1: The Wellington -- Neutral (13215)
The Final Nemesis
*

Un-themed Survival/AV/Time Challenges
--------
The Meatgrinder -- Neutral

Thanks, Vent.

Turns out I had to put an extra carriage-return at the top of the file.

I have been trying to get this to work on Vista, with no luck. Yet I know *something* is going on... well, let me just outline the steps I've taken.

1: Created the appropriate directory tree.
2: Tried making my own quickchat.mnu file
3: Made sure Vista wasn't assigning it a .txt extension
4: No dice.
5: Grabbed the pigg viewer, doublechecked the directory tree from there.
6: Did a straight copy-paste from the default quickchat.mnu file in the .pigg.
7: No dice.
8: Checked file permissions, everything seems to be in order. The same owner and permissions all throughout the entire CoX directory tree.

What's happening is that when I fire up the client (or restart it after making a change) the quickchat menu fails to display at all. Pressing the bound key or actually clicking the quickchat balloon icon does absolutely nothing.

Renaming the file or one of the overhead directories to ensure that the game client won't process the file and restarting the client fixes this. So from what I can tell, the client is seeing my changes, but there's something wrong with them.

Anyone else have any ideas about this? So far that I can tell, my syntax within the file is just fine; I've made sure to include all opening/closing braces and whatnot. As mentioned, a straight copy of the default file fails to work as well.

[ QUOTE ]
Slotting advice:

Tar Patch:
3 Recharge, 3 Slow.


[/ QUOTE ]

Just to emphasize, adding the slows to Tar Patch is a must if you fight on anything other than Villainous. TP will work fine without slows on even-cons, but once you get into the +2-3 realm, it won't keep those higher-cons in the area reliably without slow enhancements.

You don't have to six-slot TP right away, because there's going to be oodles of powers in Fire/Dark that need slots in the early game, but you definitely want it sixed before you get out of the late 20s.

Caltrops

I routinely four-slot Caltrops on any character that has it. One recharge, three slows. Granted, the extra slows do absolute jack-all against even-con foes... but without those slows, an un-enhanced set of 'trops won't slow down higher cons very well.

Three slows makes them quite effective all the way up to the purple patch. Wolves, of course, will walk right through them, but that's been true for ages.

Mind, I write this as a */traps MasterMind, where area-denial is a handy thing to keep my henchmen from getting chopped into bits in the later levels.

Y'know, that one just blew right by me. Yes, that's exactly the command I meant. Sorry for any confusion.

Yeah, it's understandable that there are exceptions. Bots/* masterminds make for some truly lethal 'reapers' once they get all bots fully upgraded.

Oh, certainly, everyone has different slottings they like. I did a lot of endredux mainly because I'm a very 'steamroller' mastermind--once I get everything up and going, there's little to no pausing for rest unless people are dead, there's an AV, or Something Else Bad has happened.

Update:

After some extensive testing against our love-to-hate-'em Longbow, I have determined that the cone from the Battle Drone's Full-Auto-ish power is quite huge. In fact, it seems to be the exact same size as the real thing.

The reason I couldn't see this at first is that the damage numbers from the back rows of groups weren't showing up. If I gave an attack order and then moved forward into the group of bad guys, those damage numbers suddenly appeared over their heads. This seems like some kind of rendering artifact, as the damage still occurs even though the numbers don't show.

So, if you've ever played an AR blaster or corrupter and have used Full Auto, aim the Battle Drones just like you would the real thing. You will be pleasantly surprised.