Jeremia_Bane

@VKhaun:
Thats going to be painful, remember when i said Thermal doesn't do well with every primary? I was thinking ninja then. They have pretty much zero resists to start with(apart from oni) and their defense is only soso either. All Thermal will be adding to that will be 24% resists and two mediocre heals.

To put that into perspective a set like Beasts will have about the same resists unbuffed as your ninja buffed, while still being ahead on defense.

I have a ninja/dark and its painful. I don't even want to think about how it would be with /thermal. I have to be blunt here, imho ninja is the worst primary you could pick for /thermal, maybe tied with /poison, but that atleast will be golden vs ST. In short, you better really really love that concept ...

@Mad Grim:
Im not that sold on ninja being king of ST damage, someone actually parsed that? The genin and jounin do alot of damage for sure, but i always felt the oni to be really lacking compared to the bruiser(mainly due to fury i guess) or assbot.

P.S.: Did you count the genin dps towards the ninjas ST damage? If so thats your error right there, you can't count them, they are dead. I swear i saw one offing himself while sharpening his sword the other day, if there are actual enemies involved ...

Personally im kind of enamored with TA and Storm, your experience with your emp defender being the reason why. Most groups, even pugs, hardly need more direct survivability in the form of additional resistances, defense or even heals.

They need to kill stuff fast and in a controlled manner(no adds, scatter etc), things like glue arrow, OSA, EMP arrow, snow storm and the various -res/def powers do exactly that. Especially Storm is imho underrated, its not just about uncontrolled KB. Just using freezing rain and snow storm alone you already contribute more to the team in damage and mitigation than some entire ATs, and hurricane is about the best "i don't want you guys coming here" ability there is, i mean how can a -35% tohit debuff toggle ability with pushback NOT be awesome?

Those pure heal buff classes are on/off kind of things, awesome if you need them but saturated real quick in a team if there is more than one. And then you stand around like a clown with your finger up your nose wondering if anyone would notice if you just /follow and go get yourself a pizza.

Edit: Thermal is cool too i guess, but it doesn't really harmonize with all primaries that well. Also i don't like it conceptually as a resistance set lacking CC protection. I mean on paper it sounds like you could carry a group alone since you buff resistances and can heal. But then again, the resistances are quite a bit weaker than a defenders as are the heals. And resistances + heals are not so hot to begin with unless you already have alot of them...

Well i can tell you that i would absolutely hate having to face a bots/TA on any of my MMs. Glue arrow + OSA + EMP + ... and then the stupid assbot doing his inferno rocket thing, that would be nice ... not. Demons are not as tough vs fire as one might think(especially after eating a acid and disruption arrow), especially with /dark since more than half of them have their strong resists to toxic or cold. They also lack any kind of slow resist, meaning they are going to get baked by the sequence above while doing their best slomo running impression.

TA in general has a truckload of awesome ... well tricks. Bots i just picked for the AoE concentration in the tier 3 pet and their fully ranged nature.

1) Ignoring resistances and assuming an immobile target probably Thugs due to Arsonist and Bruiser performing above average for pure dps in their bracket. Also Enforcers grant +10% damage for all pets due to assault leadership toggle while doing very respectable damage themselves.

2) That depends a whole lot on the primary/secondary chosen, a merc/FF will do less than a fire/kin(either corr or def) while i feel a thug/poison may very well do stupid amounts of damage to a single target due to the massive -resists and -regen.

For me MM are the ultimate supporters, not because they bring so much of it, but because they have the time to actually use it without neglecting their other set. The primary set of them is pretty much a passive set, so they can concentrate on their secondary while still doing damage through their primary. So imho they lend themselves well to the more active secondary sets.

Thats all i said, that its difficult. But actually i wouldn't care about difficult(difficult doesn't exist, you can set mobs to 1/-3, how could they be difficult?), thus i called it frustrating because you can't level at the difficulty setting you feel is appropiate for your char. And personally i disagree that other chars have it equally hard, khelds imho are the only ones that are given problems without a solution(at the time). Its a leftover from years ago, and the fact it doesn't get adressed is imho a general sign of the neglect this AT receives. Im aware of the changes they got, but if you compare it to the attention other ATs receive, ATs that are already extremely well off... i just can't be happy about it and see no purpose in pretending i am.

And about my server, zukunft(the german one), i appreciate your help really, but im already in the progress of moving over to union. Thats a move i actually started before my break 2 years ago. Ironically a server named zukunft(=future), lacks exactly that.

I can see its a whole different matter here on union as far as teams are concerned, but im leaving behind old friends(that are currently not playing) who will most likely not follow me due to the language barrier. So again, im not happy about that either. But the server discussion is offtopic anyway, there is a point when it doesn't matter which channels you are in because simply put you are mostly alone in them anyway. Im saying this as someone who remembers how it was years ago, when you couldn't even go 15min without getting an invite and you could simply start a new team and have it full in 5 min anytime(unless everyone was already in a team).

Personally i think the kheldian difficulty curve is to steep(too hard early to lategame, then wham easy). Too many essential abilities coming way to late on one hand, and too many unbalanced bumps in enemy group difficulty because of the "quantum dudes". Unbalanced refers here to the automatic difficulty system btw, not the existance of quantums per se.

Yes sure, "gravity well" will help, unless there is a mezzer AND a quantum dude in a group(which pretty much amounts to two mezzers, which is pretty steep considering it will happen even on low difficulty settings). No matter how you set the difficulty, its either too easy or too hard early-midgame. Too hard if a normal group without quantums is just doable, too easy if a normal group with quantums is doable and you meet 95% groups without them.

I also do not see the purpose in randomly throwing enemies at a player before giving him the tools to handle them. I just came back from a 2+ year hiatus, and grouping has gotten quite a bit harder on my old server(and im respectfully declining the offer to buy servertransfers for my 10+ chars).


Imho no other AT suffers from this, some other have a hard time aswell, but its continiously hard and you simply set the difficulty accordingly which will keep things interesting instead of frustrating. Im a bit sad about that, since i always love the hybrid/jack-of-all-trades types of chars in other games, but i just can't grow to like the khelds ingame(i like them fine on paper).

On a somewhat unrelated note, maybe it would be a good idea to implement automatic bar switching for forms, its almost a basic prerequsite for playing a tri- or dualformer and players not aware of binds, reading forums or playing a localised client can get mighty frustrated without it. Afaik this AT doesn't require a prior lvl 50 anymore, there is nothing in the ingame description to prepare new players for all the pitfalls of khelds, and the rough ride they sign up for early on.


Edit: For me the journey to 50, aswell as the results at 50 are equally important. Im aware khelds can do awesome things at 50 with proper IOs, but so can other ATs. Also i don't like how the forms get pretty much left by the roadside, first with the whole pool powers and now with the incarnate system. If they want us to just hop into form to fire single ability or two and then switch back to human they should make formchange instant imho.

For me its a bit of the reverse, i don't particularly like melee ATs as i tend to loose all orientation once im in the thick of things(caves with big teams...) and inevitably fall off a cliff, or get stuck on some objects, or add that group way over there ... scrapperlock is really too nice a term for me.

That being said i really like the mezzprotection and survivability that melee chars get, so i kinda come from the polar opposite but head in the same direction. Anyway those where my impressions:


1. MM. The BG modus of the pets makes you feel tough, and sets like /FF or /Traps offer mezz protection. It was good, but keeping the pets under control is like herding cats. Also even a tiny error can get all your pets nuked by an AE(yeah i fell off a cliff and the FF gen followed me leaving my pets with murdered defenses...).

Though i dislike the slippery slope of it, if something goes wrong your reduced to a helpless bystander. Not at all like a melee who can pop a couple of inspirations and go to town.


2. Kheldians. I admit i don't get em. They gain alot for being on a team, but to me it felt like i gave only very little back. Unless you count KB. I like their toughness, but didn't care much for their attacks and lack of mezz protection outside dwarf.

Im still playing these regularly, trying to level them up ... i just wish the forms and ranged attacks outside nova would be more meaningful and less frustrating(i like KB on squishies because it helps them, not on tanky ATs though).


3. Domi's. Very fun, very strong. Im really happy with the damage, though you do need to actively manage your defenses. On the other hand, missing 3 holds in a row on a boss can get really old really fast, with no other char i felt so much at the mercy of the rnd post level 20. Permadom can give you nice mezz resists, but most of the time those are not even needed since you have everything under control anyway.

Its an awesome AT performing well solo and in a team, and the few times the rnd hates you can be covered by inspirations easily.


4. VEAT. Its hard to describe how well rounded these feel(imho you really notice that this is the last AT the devs made), or how well they perform in about any situation either solo or in a team. They also have the advantage that if you do not like the ranged aspect you can just respec(or dualspec) to melee instead. And even if you relapse and play them "only" as a melee, their team buffs will still allow you to bring something else to the team that your other melee chars can't offer.



Personally i liked the VEAT the most so far(fortunata is beating out domis for me due to the team buffs) in my quest for a durable ranged AT, and i see alot of potential with the kheldians ... once i figure them out that is.

Meines wissens gibt es die passport abzeichen dafür nicht. Die gab es damals für einen chartransfer von den amiservern auf die EU server, was heute nicht mehr möglich ist.

Tja, jetzt wo wir bis januar freie transfers haben wunder ich mich doch ob die population on zukunft nicht noch weiter schrumpft.

Ich persöhnlich werde wohl zumindest alle meine Schurken nach Union transferieren. Ich kenne alle die argumente das man nur ne volle f-liste braucht und schon findet man immer ein team aber das ist einfach nurnoch quatsch.

Zukunft just in diesem moment:
Lvl 1-50: 7 Schurken(da ist der mit dem ich eingeloggt war mitgezählt)
Teams: 0

Union:
Lvl 1-50: 41
Teams: 3-4(geschätzt)

Jetzt mal ernsthaft, wie will man mit 7 leuten(wohlgemerkt 1-50, da waren lvl 2 und so bei) ein vernünfitges team machen? Selbst wenn sich der ganze server versammelt hätte, alle gemeinsam losgezogen wären hätte es nichtmal für ein volles team gerecht. Und die tatsache das nichtmal ein team unterwegs war deutet ja wohl mehr als deutlich daraufhin wie die aussichten dazu stünden alle unter einen hut zu bekommen. Mal ganz zu schweigen davon das die meisten TFs lvlbeschränkungen haben die nochmal die hälfte ausgeschlossen hätte.

Für die heldenseite hab ich noch ein kleines bisschen hoffnung, aber auch nicht gerade die welt.

I enjoy the MA alot and try to atleast get other people to play the developers choice missions but its tough.

For one, you can be sure that you never join a team running MA missions on their own. So i have to make my own team, no problem ill do that. Then the second problem arises, if you whisper people asking if they want to join your team, you better tell them ahead of time your doing MA missions or they will ***** and moan about it forever. Third problem, if you whisper people, asking them to join your team and telling them your doing MA missions you ALSO have to tell them your not doing farms, but real missions or they just reply with a 'no thx i dont farm' or somesuch.

So here i am, writing something like a fourliner just to get people into my team, explaining like 8 times a day that, yes MA missions DO give you XP, no i will avoid those missions that give reduced XP, yes im even willing to go for standard rewards if you absolutly detest MA tickets and so on and so forth.

In all honesty its such a logistical nightmare to run a MA team that i just stop bothering, the fact that you cant even abort a mission without disbanding and reforming the team cause its handled as a TF is really just another minor annoyance.

There are two kinds of people where the MA is concerned:

1. They have no clue about custom mob rules, tickets or even the existence of Developers Choice missions. They only see that they dont get any extra XP at the end of missions and thats that for them.

2. They who actually put some time into learning about the MA and know its nooks and crannys, yet got horribly burned by teams led by 1. people and plainly refuse to enter the AE with anyone they dont know.

So yeah, i only enter the MA with people on my global list anymore, and even then usually only if i want to play in the RWZ with hero/villain mixed teams.

Ah many thanks for the answers so far, this already helped me alot. Maybe a bit of background on why i am looking forward to kheldians so much:

I have up to now extensively played MM, Dominators and Corruptors while only dabbling in Blasters/Scrappers/Brutes/Stalkers a little bit. One could say i played alot of squishy chars which is due to my prefereance for redside and long range combat. So im very much looking forward to a actually tougher class(and resistance based to boot, which will be a first for me) that still has long range attacks.

Never played a blaster or brute beyond lvl 15 or some such, and my highest scrapper is lvl 22 i think, so i guess i will be pretty much content with even PB lvl of damage. Im looking forward to lightform over eclipse cause the former confers mezz protection in addition to its resistance boni.

Btw, how tough is a Kheldian in human form(if he puts his mind to it)? Looking at the numbers in mids it seems that they are significantly tougher than resistance based Scrappers due to 10% higher resistance limits, and even brutes seem to be having quite a bit of trouble getting to their resistance cap without ultimates unless they get some major buffage from the team. Are non dwarfform kheldians as tough as i think they are?(Already noticed that Ecplipse/Lightform/Cosmic Balance/Dark Sustainance doesnt suppress when mezzed which lessens the lethel effect of those atleast in teams quite a bit imho).

Edit: Just read your reply shoe, it kinda seems to lean to Triform which is something i like in CONCEPT, yet im still a bit unclear on WHY you change through forms in a single battle. Could you give an example or something? The way i imagine it goes something like:

1. Start battle against a tough group in Dwarf form to take out mezzing LT.
2. Once Mezzing LT is dead switch to human and scatter/stun/mire/eclipse/whatever the minions.
3. Switch to nova to burn down the boss while kiting cause he cant fly and relies on melee attacks.

Is it something like that? Cause i have a hard time seeing why i would want to switch forms often in a fight with the long cast time they have and the huge disadvantages they bestow. Especially with the WS, couldnt you in the example above just jump right into the middle of them, Gravity well the LT, eclipse and then nova to blast them all? Or in other words, if your not tanking, why bother going into dwarf?

Hi all, i am well on my way to get my first lvl 50 hero and preparing myself to play a kheldian(I love underdogs and 'jack of all trades'). Now i have been reading up on them alot, and try to team with them as often as possible yet there are still some things that remain unclear to me.

1. Human-, Bi- and Triformers. While im clear on what is meant by these definitions, im unclear on how you play them. Lets say your a Triformer, do you choose a form based on teammarkup and your perceived role within it and then stick to it, or do you hop in and out of forms like a monkey(i have seen both)? Particullary im wondering where the advantage of a Triformer lies compared to lets say a Human/Nova + Human/Dwarf dual build user(or really any other combination) which is kinda the route i expect myself going.

2. Setboni. Many good setboni are 5-6 slots deep, can you be a triformer and still do your thing while trying to softcap ranged defense or something similar? This question kinda ties into the first cause im not really sure on what a triformer is actually trying to do. Do you aim for different setboni if you specialise your Kheldian? For example ranged defense/damage boni as a nova, recharge/status resistance as a dwarf.

3. Peacebringer vs. Warshade. Strong consensus seems to be for the WS to be the better Triformer or even Humanform Kheldian, however lots of the stuff i have read seems to totally disregard Cosmic Balance/Dark Sustenance(probably cause it predates the I13 changes). Personally i vastly prefer the PB version of balancing the team, especially from the dwarf perspective. Seems not that unlikely to get 3-4 Scrappers/Blasters in a team which would cap your resistances permanently as a Dwarf(apart from psi), while eclipse not only needs you to go to human form regularly(which can get you mezzed), but also needs several foes to get the same effect. Am i correct in assuming PB are generally better tanks in your average scrapper heavy team while WS will gernerally pull more damage in the same team?

4. How much of a problem is it for the WS to not have a Taunt effekt in his AE? Im not really clear on how you get more than 5 guys(or if several crucial targets are to far from each other to be affected by a single taunt) to stick to your WS. For example groups with several elite bosses like you get in the ITF or a drawn out ambush, something like that. Lacking both a taunting damage aura AND a taunt effect in your regular AE seems like atleast an annoyance to me.

5. Damage. People complain about PB low human only form damage, looking at it on mids i dont really see the problem. Comparing them to say a corruptor(a class i played and generally enjoyed) they actually seem to have superior base damage to most sets, and thats assuming no buffs due to team. So maybe i misunderstood, is it activation times, recharge or endurance thats limiting PB instead of the damage of the attacks themselves?

I am planning to make a PB first. Dual Build from early on, one build Human only for solo(i take it its hard in the beginning) the other Nova/Dwarf for teams. Reason basicly that i want to see all powers the PB has to offer, yet still want to bring the full utility of the class into teams. Im favouring the PB because im not all that comfortable with the many WS powers that require certain circumstances like dead bodies to heal or living bodies to get resistances. And strange as it sounds i think i prefer Lightform to eclipse?

I would really like to get some views and thoughts of experienced kheldians on the subject, just want to stress that i am aware of the potential of mire/double mire for the WS yet im not that hot over just damage especially if it looks just a tad unhealthy to attain(in human form jumping right into the middle of a bunch of mezzing/endusapping/KB foes that can suppress your defensetoggles ... ehrm nope?).

P.S.: Do the human form shields/buffs detoggle if you switch form, or do they merely get suppressed and reactivate if go out of the form again?(i fear i know the answer but 'hope springs eternal' and i have to ask)

I really think thugs in this thread get a little overrated, especially compared to bots. Thugs basicly have three things going for them:

1. Arsonists Flame Bomb(15 feet)
2. Lts Tactics(30feet)
3. Bruisers Footstomp(15feet)

I purposely ignore plain single target attacks, cause obviously every set does that, and does it well. Yet as strange as it sounds, all of these things i listed are actually done better by bots.

1. Incendiary Missiles is plain better. It has the same recharge, 5 feet bigger area and the burn it leaves behind is just way stronger and stays longer too.

2. Prots bubbles are better, now hear me out, im obviously not talking about pure defense. The problem is the thug version forces you to lump you pets together, which is just plain bad because it forces you to either keep your bruiser on a leash or have your other pets follow him around. Both leads to a significant dps loss in my experience(not to mention you get more vulnurable to AOE).

3. Ah yes the footstomp. Its kinda awesome, pity it has to compete with half a dozen other attacks(bruiser has 7 attacks, 4 with under 10 sec recharge) and usually gets fired either way to late or not at all. And anyway, swarm missiles does more damage, mostly due to greater radius.

Also lets not say the bruiser is a tank, thats more than a little bit misleading. He has 5.25% Fire, Cold and Toxic resistance more than the Assault Bot, and 21% psionic resistence less and no taunt effects at all.

Oh and lets not forget the Arsonist, my is named kenny. You remember kenny? Its that kid from southpark that dies EVERY episode. Cause thats what my kenny does too. By the time you see him sprinting into that 16+ spawn AFTER he got their attention with his flame bomb its pretty much to late to call him back anyway. But its not just that he likes to melee, and die alot, no whats really annoying is that your actually dependend on that crazy 500 hp bruce lee wannabe monkey for his AOE damage so you end up having to resummon him every time he dies, which he does, alot.

Another way to look at it is that thugs are bottom end heavy and tend to failure cascade rapidly, they depend on a tier 1 pet for alot of their AOE damage, and if a tier 2 pet dies or gets out of range ALL pets imediatly loose a big chunk of defense which usually leads to more dead pets.

Bots on the other hand are top end heavy, pretty much everything you need to devastate a group of minions and LTs is in your tier 3. You have no single essential tier 1 pet, and the defense buffs of your tier 2 persist after their death, giving you a greater chance to regroup midfight.

P.S.: Im not saying thugs are worse than bots, i actually enjoy both sets immensly. They play rather differently with the bots requirering less micromanagement and having far superior AOE damage(honestly, i feel dirty just comparing them) and the thugs having still very solid AOE damage yet significantly more single target damage.

Imho bots make sense for a busy secondary where you dont have the time to micromanage your pets, while thugs might be more fun for the more passive secondarys, i assure you the arsonist and bruiser will keep you busy.

[/color]<blockquote><font class="small">Antwort auf:[/color]<hr />
There is *kind of* a way around this. It's not ideal and I have to say your idea of a toggle works much better. But as you're dark (I have a dark/zombs MM myself) using Shadow Fall you can get just past the enemy as you launch your first attack, while the pets are in defensive mode. Then when they attack you, the pets should have followed you until they're right next to the enemy anyway. So they'll attack back at about the right time to use melee instead of ranged.

So, in short... make sure you get in there first before things get crowded, and start off with a debuff like Darkest Night to make sure you don't take too much of an alpha strike.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thats the way i actually do it if im solo, it does indeed get your pets into melee without having to drop BG mode. Sadly this solution assumes 3 things:

1. Your groupmates play along and let you take a lead position.
2. The enemies dont have strong AEs that will go off before my DN and kill half my minions(hello scrapyarders).
3. You are the only MM in the team.

Especially point two is bad imho, with me taking the alpha it usually spells death for my already weakened genin if there is AE. Also remember im talking about teams, so we are talking about several Boss/Lts per spawn which can easily be several lvl above my minions. If i try this tactic it usually means i have to resummon atleast my genin every fight.

Hi all, this is my first post here so bare with me. I just startet playing this game 3 weeks ago, and so far it has been a blast. Its a great game, and a even better community and so far i have enjoyed every class and activity i tried.

Apart from the ninja MM. I love the concept, i love the abilities and i can even deal with the squishy nature of what are essentially close range pets(though i dont understand why MM pets are exactly the opposite from the ATs, where close range equals tough).

But what i cant deal with is the bug, namely the one where melee pets stay in ranged mode(and to a much much lesser extend the one where ranged pets go into melee).

Just to give you the right idea, i do use numpad controls and excessivly use goto commands to get the pets into melee. And it works, if your alone. But today was the first time i teamed with more than 2 people on this toon, and it was a total nightmare. These are the issues i had:

1. Using goto to get your pets into melee doesnt work reliably if the way is blocked by players, or if there simply isnt enough room for all the melee pets. Worst is, usually half of them get to the goto place and start kicking, but then you screw it all up trying to get the other half also into melee range(or the enemy is simply dead before you get all of your pets in "scrapperlock" where they will usually keep meleeing).

2. I die, alot. Why? Because i cant use BG mode. I get killed by stray AEs and cones while trying to place my minions(or heal them, im /dark) so they actually attack. I also have to be pretty close to the fight so that i can position the goto circle close enough to the enemies(its visually hard from too far out as you usually cant see the ground with all the people).

3. With 5+ players, one of them a fellow mastermind, it gets damn hard to spot the "lazy" minions who think they are some sort of legolas. Also i admit i dont have a attack and goto command for each single minion, only for each tier, so i usually disrupt the other two genin that are actually doing what they should.

Sorry about the rant but i just had to vent some anger. I know you already know all of this, and even i knew about this as new as i am. I just didnt expect it to be so aggrevating.

But i also HAVE to bring up something which would fix 90% of my(and maybe other peoples) issues. The whole problem is that the pets are stupid AND try to make complex decisions like wether to use their longrange attacks or not(which is situational, and they lack situational awareness).

I would kindly ask the devs to consider implementing a command into the macro system which strips the targetet pet(if owned by the mastermind) of its close/range powers, with an simple on/off toggle.

Examples:

/petcom attacks ranged 0
Deactivates(removes) all ranged powers from a targetet minion

/petcom_all attacks ranged 1$$petcom_all attacks melee 0

Would restore all ranged attacks to all pets, while disabling all their melee attacks.

If we had such a control we could focus more on playing the game, and less on babysitting our minions, while still retaining the usefulness of mixed range/melee attacks. Also the people who are fine with the way melee pets behave can keep playing just as they do now.

P.S. I know the devs are probably looking for a more sophisticated fix, and i do understand that its obviously not as easy, but this would fix most of the issues melee pets have in groups i believe. Also there already is a system in place to add new abilities to pets, so it hopefully wouldnt be as hard simply making a ability that simply strips/adds powers without end/time use or gfx changes(ofc only adds powers previously unlocked by the two pet upgrades).