Hart

Thanks, Rajani!

Looks like I'm best off grabbing a VIP month and trying it out, finding out whether I care about Incarnate content or not. If nothing else, I'll get one of my tokens out of the way.

Seems like Incarnate rewards are only applicable when raiding, and my characters are already vastly overpowered for anything non-raid. So.. I guess it's a matter of refamiliarizing myself with CoX and trying to join a few raids.

Are raids generally a guild-only activity the way they are in games like EQ and WoW, or more open / pick up groups? I remember mothership raids and hamidon raids being popular, but more or less scheduled events that took all comers. I'd hate to find that I had to join a guild in order to access the new content; I own a massive VG base I've spent years building up.

I've been playing CoX on and off since i3, and have amassed 18 tokens worth of the new loyalty program.

I have two options: I can either join the VIP program, or I can drop about $200 on this game's mickey money and earn the 16 tokens I need to permanently unlock IOs, which I think are necessary to enjoy the game. I've got probably 50 billion worth of IOs slotted into my toons, so without taking advantage of one of these options I doubt I'll play at all.

What I'm curious about here is what I don't get with each of these options. The FAQs are great at highlighting the benefits of VIP membership, but I could care less about customer support - and other aspects are unclear. Can I permanently unlock Praetoria? Incarnate system? Episodic content? I'm not sure what I'm missing out on with each of these options, and CoX isn't going to highlight the places where customers are getting nickle-and-dimed (or in this case, five-and-ten-dollared).

Can anyone either answer this question or point me to an existing resource that answers it? I don't want to drop $200 on a game just to be infuriated by the pieces I can't buy for love or money without a VIP account. On the other hand, I don't want to waste money on a VIP account that gives me short-term benefits if I could buy the whole shebang at once and play for free forever for $200 up front. I particularly don't want to pay the $15 for a VIP account and find out that there are still pieces of the game I can't access without paying more.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance!

If not, you can put -res in any power with a defense debuff. I have one in the Def/Tohit toggle on my Arch/Rad, and I don't see any issue with lethal at level 40.

'cause KCrash is a 7.5% recharge and Fortunata don't really need much Defense slotting. IIRC, with perma ML and well-slotted defenses, they don't need set bonuses to softcap melee/ranged/aoe.

If you keep it up 100% of the time on an 8 man team, Speed Boost takes 7 seconds to apply every 2 minutes. It is a greater contribution to your team's success than anything else you can do in those 7 seconds.

Build-wise, SB takes one power pick and no slots. It leaves you 94% of your time (113 seconds every 2 minutes) to do other stuff.

Yes, 'sb plz' tells suck. Yes, sb requires you to switch between targeting enemies and targeting friends. Yes, forethought and planning are necessary to keep the buff up.

I'd still say it's a lazy /kin that skips the power. Nothing infuriates me more than a Fire/Kin troller who skipped SB telling me 'sb plz'.

I've got a purpled Mind/Psy/Ice, and in my opinion softcapping S/L isn't going to help much.

Why? You're not going to worry about anything except AVs. You'll have several options for permanent, hard control of anything Boss and below. EBs can be easily perma-confused, and if you build to kill AVs you'll have the tools you need to handle EBs.

If you softcap S/L, you've got two swings before you get splattered. If you crank your recharge into the 200% range, you've got mesmerize recharged before the AV gets a second swing. That's instant mag 8 sleep for a permadom, and with that much recharge you'll have near-perma Drain Psyche for the regen debuff.

Drop the purple set in Confuse, crank your global recharge as high as you can get it, and try to keep a 53/54 AV confused for 2 minutes. Make sure to allow gaps for using Hasten, Domination, and Drain Psyche. If you can keep the AV permanently confused and drained, you can solo it by stabbing it with a toothpick. If you can keep it drained, mostly confused, and slept when it's not confused that also works - just more slowly.

To start off, you might try spamming confuse until you see it 'stick' with PTOD up, then using Mass Confuse and approaching the target while you continue to spam Confuse at it. Then alternate Confuse with Drain Psyche and whatever you're using for damage.

Point is, you're not going to live through two hits and it's impossible to die in one hit. S/L isn't going to help against Numina anyway, so you're better off with obscene amounts of recharge and confuse duration.

I've had a Rad/Kin at 40 since a couple days after CoV release and purpled out an Assault Rifle/Cold. I'm currently working on a 40 Archery/Radiation, having deleted my 42 Fire/Kin.

Fire's best on paper, but Rain of Fire works at cross purposes with Fulcrum Shift. I want stuff to hug me; Rain wants stuff to run away. Rain's important for Fire/'s damage, Fulcrum's half the reason I rolled a /Kin. I'd go DP/Kin over Fire/Kin because:
1) any /kin is going to be damage capped anyway, and DP will have more AoEs
2) The main DP cone is also wider than Flame Breath, and therefore easier to use
3) DP has an additional very narrow cone for straggling bosses and lieuts

I'd go Fire/Cold over DP/Cold or Arch/Cold, though. /Cold plays well with weapon sets because redraw doesn't become a problem. You open with your debuffs, then start shooting. If it's a long fight, maybe you redraw once after reapplying Sleet or Snow Storm.

However, DP and Arch can't take advantage of /Cold's slows or knockdowns. Most DP attacks risk knocking stuff out of Sleet unless you swap ammo. Arch's sphere AOE has a 50/50 chance of knocking stuff out of Sleet. Rain of Fire is awesome for leveraging the 90%+ slow you get from stacking Sleet with Snow Storm or Heat Loss. You've got no reason to be standing in the middle of the pack on a /Cold, so the positioning for Flame Breath is more reasonable, and /Cold's intense single target debuffs work well with Fire/'s intense single target damage.

If I recall correctly, a Sonic/ with enough recharge can skip the t3 blast and just cycle the t1 and t2 for better damage.

Not sure how well it works or how much recharge you need, but I'm sure someone can explain it.

My Elec/Kin end drains AVs now that she has Transference.

Overall, Elec is a lot more work than most control sets to keep stuff locked down. I find myself pushing lots of buttons, where my Fire/FF pretty much stands things to death.

I'd just like to say: Toldja so.

Blasters do more damage solo, but corrs cause more damage to be done in groups.

I'd dump Frostwork for anything else. I'd take a second Brawl over Frostwork, on a controller.

If you haven't already, go check out the /cold corrupter guide for a great explaination of why Frostwork doesn't matter.

Good point. The question is how players will choose to get their LotGs.

I've got a few billion to my name, but I still prefer to get my LotG, Numina, and Miracle procs with AMerits. I save the infamy for cheaper stuff - Positron's, Decimation, and anything else I can buy outright at ~10-20m per IO.

SS/Fire with stacked rage is a strong competitor, but you need a ton of recharge to get Foot Stomp / Burn to recycle fast enough.

If you're far enough away or use smoke to reduce your targets visibility range you can get Flashfire off fine. My Fire/Storm could open with Flashfire without reprecussions, as can my Fire/FF if I use Smoke first.

You become visible when you START casting Flashfire, not when the power actually hits the enemies.

If you've got Traps as a secondary, you're forced to take an immobilize as your first power.

AVs can be immobilized pretty readily.

Immobilized stuff is easy to blow up with Time Bomb.

...and that's about all I can think of to do with it.

I like 'em mainly for the -recovery. Seems like everything they do has a chance to -recov the target, and there are two of them. I can't imagine successfully end draining an AV without them.

I ran an Elec/Kin controller to 31 without Stamina and had no problems as long as I was on a large team.

...then I respecced to pick up Stamina and was able to keep my blue bar pegged out 100% of the time, which was quite nice.

It's not just a damage problem, but Fire Assault is more of a single target set.

Gravity doesn't get it's main 'every pack' AOE control until 26. It's also limited to two real AOE control options - a stun in Wormhole and the usual AOE hold.

Most other sets have a third soft control. Mind, plant, and Ice have an AOE sleep. Ice and Earth have AOE knockdown patches. Elec has a combination of several power with short recharges that combine into persistent AOE control. Even Fire has Smoke and Bonfire.

Gravity gets Dimension Shift. On the whole, it is detrimental to your team; it prevents you from hitting things and confuses your teammates. There's nothing worthwhile to slot in it, and anything that would actually be worth using it on is immune to it.

I hang on to the AOE hold in case of a second pack when Wormhole is on cooldown, so I basically have one AOE control power. I make up for it with /storm as my secondary which gives me a lot of stacking control and positioning options, but Gravity is easily the most single-target focused control set I've played.

My bad, I was just looking at the 'New Posts' thing and didn't realize this was posted to a server forum.

So, uh.. free bump?

Sounds like it'd be great for soloing, less so for grouping.