Grey Pilgrim

Biggest thing the arc has going for it is that I like the characters and the look of all the mobs, contact, etc. Unique and makes good use costumes and the maps.

1st Mission: Two of your hostages were not visible until I saved them, but the third was. One of the invisible ones was the king. Not sure if that's a regular occurrence, or what.

Rather than having the king give a clue about hiding away as he feels the curse, I wonder if it might be better to have him say it via dialogue upon saving him? Might work better, but it could get buried in a team, I suppose.

Might also be good to work on the dialogue in the clues from the two hostages... feels a bit more like showing rather than telling... I'd like to hear the hostages say it somehow. Will give it more color.

Mission 2: I assume you want the boss to be at the front and lower level than the character? Just checking to be sure.

I think your map choice is as good as it can be for this one. I always wish we could get more of a jungle map without having to swim, though.

Mission 3: Opening one of the chests was pretty long... I like it to be a little faster, but that's up to you. The mobs that came after that didn't give any rewards, either (gravity mobs... they phased me at first, too... just making sure you want that). So... I'm not sure about this mission. You have no rewards at all for the little fighting you do, and running around a blue cave looking for glowies isn't usually a good idea of fun, heh. Might be worth having more mobs and ambushes in there, just to liven it up a bit. I can see other people not liking this for the lack of rewards.

I like having glowies unlock other glowies, but I wonder if the "portal avatar" shouldn't ambush after you make the incantation. I had to hunt around for a glowie again after that, and it seemed like it should have been a reaction to that that brought the avatar out.

Mission 4: Wonder if Chuikzu (sp?) should be a little different. He mostly just took a long while to kill. Ambushes are tried and true, of course, but there might be other options.

Mission 5: I like the use of this map (as well as your other ones, other than maybe the 3rd one, heh)... the soul freeing/killing map, eh? Pretty good encounter for what it was, too. The king was an okay challenge, but maybe there are some other things you could do to make him tougher as well. Hard to balance that, though, but it feels like he should be a rougher fight, given what the queen said earlier.

Overall, it was good! I don't have too much time to comment right now, but those were the biggest things.

No worries: MG is just joking.

He better be, anyway. If not "we can fix him... we can rebuild him!" Poor Mental is suffering from GG cooties.

Unless it's a success like the invention system, which I believe he also had a major hand in. I'm feeling positive about it, since he, Castle, and some others are working, and they have a good track record.

Dual Blades is quite good for AOE... one Pbaoe and two cones... kind of the same setup as Warmace and Battle Axe, where two of the AOEs are in your last two attacks, so you'll have to wait until 35 to really start knocking them around. Fiery Melee is the inverse... you have plenty of AOE early on, and round out your ST in the 30s. Super Strength is pretty much just Foot Stomp at 38 for AOE. Though it is a nice AOE.

For a secondary, Shields is nice, as you noted (+damage aura and Shield Charge). Any of the primaries with a damage aura will help out as well (ie, I use my two PbAOEs on my Fire/Fire tank, and Blazing Aura usually finishes off the little bit of health the minions have left while I'm taking out the boss or lts).

I'd join in, but you know me... I'd probably want to be done about 45-60 minutes too early for this. Sounds like more of a sticking point for you with this.

I am going to be on Tuesday nights throughout the semester, as that's what fits my schedule, though, so figured I would put that out there. I'd be willing to join in if I had time.

I do enjoy the AE missions that I've played, though I tend to run with the guest author and dev choice ones, mostly. Tickets are a nice bonus, but up until the 40s, I like getting the random salvage chances... and I also hate to miss out on the merits you can get from the in-game story arcs (they really do start to add up).

So I tend to do the AE stuff with my 50s, actually. Works out pretty well. Anyone run the newer guest author missions? They sound like they'd be pretty good, and the last ones were pretty interesting (though I'm not all into the lolbat stuff, heh).

Picking up Tough and bulking up your defenses sensibly is the way to go, in my experience. Just Tough alone can really up your survivability. On my Fire/Fire, I picked up Weave as well, and have about 22% defense to melee/AOE/Ranged/Psi, and it is a consistent performer no matter what I'm facing. Unless I'm facing tougher situations (like tanking an ITF), I can usually not even run Tough. I do know that the defense to Smash/Lethal route people mentioned earlier can work well, though you'll probably know it when you hit those exotic forms of damage (not too common, but they are out there). At any rate, to answer the overall question better... Fiery Aura tanks can tank just fine. Like any other tank, you just need to set them up right.

I've been working on a more offensively oriented build (no fighting pool, but lot's of recharge, +dam, +HP) to see how that goes, but I only have so much money (without IO sets, I find it lacking compared to the above setup... not enough recharge and damage, and I do feel a bit too squishy). My Fire/Fire is also probably going to be the one to go through the end game changes that Castle has been talking about, so I'm leery of spending too much on a secondary build if he's going to get a lot of other changes soon.

Playing in the STO beta, I had seen repeated room types just after the first few levels of the game (a command center type of room is used quite frequently). I also had flown around the rings of a planet a few times... the missions were different (scan these anomalies while defeating Klingon incursions, or rescue stricken miners, etc.).

That's not necessarily a criticism of STO, though it would behoove them to try to branch it out a little more with some of their mission types. It's more of a statement of how MMOs work. You're going to get it in some way, shape, or form at some point.

CoX could certainly use more map types and tilesets, and to use more varied encounters like what you see in more recent TFs and story arcs (the Midnighter arcs are a good example of what they can do now). Just adding more of those is going to add a lot to the game.

Even so, there is pretty varied stuff now. I feel like our stories are a lot more involved than WoW's, so people should always be reading those. CoX also has a lot of different enemies, we have a lot of different looks and powersets, etc. Also, moving beyond radio/paper missions is a good idea. That's the repeatable content. Getting into other types of missions is where you get the good stories, different objectives, different feels, etc.

Gauntlet does have a to-hit check against EBs and AVs, though.

I was thinking Gauntlet has a to-hit against everything the other night, but that was wrong. Gah. It does make a check on EBs and AVs, I'm quite sure, as that is one of the reasons I think it's worth taking Taunt (I looked it up a long while ago).

Mobs don't wander that much while stunned, Hera. They've fixed that annoying tricky where they could move away at sprint speeds (and leap buildings, heh), so they're not moving much. Probably the biggest issue for the stuns (on a team... they're great solo as is) is you only have it happen so much in an AOE. Whirling Hands has too weak of damage anyway, but upping its stun ability would actually be fairly nice. Other sets get aoe KD or KB, so that would go a long way toward helping on that angle.

Awesome, I've heard the "long animation" complaint far too much. 2-3 second animations are all over the place in this game, and they are usable by any set. If you or your team are screwed in the few seconds it takes to do an Energy Transfer or Total Focus, you shouldn't have been activating it in the first place (or you would have been screwed anyway).

The whole "my target is dead before the activation goes off" is overdone as well. Just plan your targeting and attacks better. I have my targets picked off from me on all my characters... my blaster was wasting attacks at range tonight. It happens. Target as best you can, and know that it's going to happen no matter what.

That isn't to say that Total Focus couldn't use some love for its animation, though. I do think that shortening it to KO Blow's length (2.3 seconds or so?) would be a great help. That said, people do tend to overdo the "it's a long animation and screws everything up" angle. Just wanting a little balance in the viewpoint on that.

Enjoy it. Drawing is one of those things I wish I still had time for. I took a bunch of drawing in high school, but I think my talents lean more to writing and photography. I'd love to pursue more things, but I just don't have the time.

I had a great comparison post going for this last night, and lost it. Grrrr.

So in short. EM has a lot of hate for it right now because of some changes that were made to it. I do agree that it needs some tweaking still, but it's not that bad of a set. Just go into it knowing you're going to be doing mostly ST damage, and you'll be okay (Shield Charge will be nice to have, though, as someone pointed out). No Tank set is really doing that badly right now. There are just some sets that obviously need some tweaking still. EM is one of them.

Soilent, you noted in your first post that you didn't like the first attacks. Well, Barrage now does more damage, and is actually worth using now. Yes, it has a 6 sec. recharge to go with it, but this is hardly uncommon for the first three ST powers that Tankers get. It works best if you think of Energy Punch as your Tier 1 (even though it's still set as a Tier 2), as it recharges faster. I felt a lot more satisfied with the attack chain I had for those first three attacks when I used Energy Punch--Barrage--Bone Smasher. Energy Punch is almost back up by the end of that without too much of a wait at low levels. With some recharge later, you can have a chain with those if you want.

The stuns in EM are also great. War Mace has some, but they're scattered all over between a few powers, and the only one I see regularly fire is Whirling Mace on a minion, and that's because I have so many on me. EM, however, has a chance for stun in most of its attacks, so you'll see it pop up quite frequently, which is nice (should be nice on Shields, which is defense based, too).

Your higher tier attacks do have longer animations, but you can roll with them and use them when needed. Your first three ST attacks aren't bad... use them when your target has low health, rather than firing off ET or Total Focus on a quarter health boss.

What, no Victory? What are we, chopped liver?

And here I thought the mods liked us... Mod8 even silenced Hamster for us!

Yup, lot of good entries in there. It's a stiff competition most months (I lost track of it at the end of last year, though) and fun to watch.

They really do need to learn how to present new costumes to players. There was a lot of interest in the shoulder cape seen for some pre-issue stuff before the Imperious TF, and then it turned out that was a unique costume for Imperious himself. Since it has happened before, care needs to be taken. It doesn't help that that outfit doesn't look too different from the concept art seen at Herocon for the Resistance, and given that you can join the Resistance... it kind of follows for people to think that you can get that look.

But yeah, it's sometimes hard to tell where people will go with things. I can feel for War Witch there. Still, I saw that pic and immediately thought "ah, new map, tileset, and costume." I do have to assume she knew that a lot of that was shown, otherwise why give the teaser?

But still, no need to get too upset. A new NPC costume does add something to the game, and I can hopefully still assume that other new costume options are on their way for players... even if they aren't glowie pieces. I'll be okay with NPC specific costumes as long as we get some nice new options for our own characters.

Voted. I should note here, Scooter, that you picked a very challenging pose. Skaters look inhuman when they do it in real life, and drawing that is an even bigger challenge. I think you pulled it off pretty well, as it didn't seem off in its proportions, etc. (though I do wonder if your character needs to be a little darker so she stands out from the back ground more... or vice versa).

I did have to vote for Lousy Day, another Victoryite. I am consistently impressed with his work, as I have said before and in the thread you linked to. I'm just sad I can't put this one on my desktop: it's far too tall!

Ha, a lot of these are hilarious. Good chuckles during the work day.

Juggertha has some well done panels and action in his, but I'm always captured by Lousy Day's look and abilities. So Lousy Day it is.

He really should change his name... haven't seen him do anything lousy in art or in game.

7 PM Central means 8 PM Eastern, so you joined a team that did it an hour before us, Bear.

We grabbed a few from this thread, and a few that were on at the time (thanks for joining in, Scooter and co.), and ran it with 6 in 2:20. I think it is easier with 4-5 people, but it wasn't too bad... what slowed us down most is when we split (as usual, heh). Forgot that you should clear up to the hostages in the 2nd mission... I think that was our slowest from mistakes on our part.

That toxic damage is nasty. My defense wasn't THAT bad with Invince up, but I was still getting tagged a lot. I had that one unlucky mob that managed to drop me before I could pop Dull Pain. Grrr.

Still a shame that they don't rework this TF to make it more unique. I probably would run it then. As is, I only run it when I really need it for TF Commander.

*added* No worries, Power.

I hope people noted War Witch's post on Friday, where she showed a screenshot of a resistance member from GR. New costume options and a new map and map tileset, all shown in that little picture. There's obviously stuff in the works, and we only know so much about it all. That's all I'm arguing for- they have stuff in the works, and we have little peeks at it. No need to get overly rampant with the speculation from there (though I have to say again that little updates every week would keep people focused on what is coming for sure, rather than all of this speculating peole have been resorting to. Get cracking, marketing!).