Kenteko

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  1. Quote:
    Originally Posted by CrazyJerseyan View Post
    Zep - agreed

    I don't actually remember the last time the toon has died, but when it does, a PB doesn't need an emp or wakes, it also has a built in rez as well. I bring these up b/c people speak on the negatives of PBs but I rarely see anyone mention the strengths of the class.
    I should point out that if one of your benefits is a self rez, then every single blaster and every single dominator already has one against you: Rise of the Phoenix. Except theirs does nova level damage, makes them invulnerable, and they have a better/stronger nova on top of that. This also includes anyone who specs fiery aura (scrapper/tanker/brute) and everyone who specs dark armor, willpower, and regeneration.

    Oh, Warshades get one too. It makes them invulnerable.

    So already you're losing out to pretty much over half the ATs, in addition to your sibling AT by a factor of exponential qualities. Regardless of what you believe you bring to the table, it's very likely that you can say one given thing, throw a rock, and hit 20 something other characters that bring the exact same thing, only better. Nova spam is great until you compare it to a character of equal value who does your job, better, and is likely tougher in the process. Blasters liquefy groups with equivalent recharge bonuses while likely being soft capped in the process (even moreso with archery and fire). Defenders/corruptors bring support a PB absolutely never could on top of fairly reliable repeatable CC on par or greater than yours.

    When your belief of being awesome revolves around the stars aligning and the absolute perfect team being put at your feet, realize that IN ANY EQUIVALENT SITUATION, every single other AT in the game will be better except maybe one or two that simply do not scale that well. If I built a team around a brute, scrapper, or a blaster, they'd go from "passably good" to "Godzilla." PBs are phenomenally bad from a numbers perspective all around, and it really shows compared to most things.

    Anyone can contribute in this game, nobody's saying otherwise, however the fact is that the Peacebringer is Superfriends era Aquaman: Sure he has his uses, but why would you ever, ever care to drag Aquaman along when any other Superfriend would do the job in half the time with less trouble?
  2. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Wanted_NA View Post
    Ack..definitely tossing my reactive interface out of the window then...I think I might just go for the -ToHit Buff or something. I've no idea.
    The -tohit is full resisted by AVs, so the 5% amounts to around 1% and 5% fully stacked. Reactive is sadly one of the better choices.
  3. The -regen interface (and all the interfaces) are resistable as normal debuffs. They last ten seconds making stacking consistently beyond extremely challenging for anyone without a pet. Lore pets can apply the interface debuff but at the moment, Diamagnetic and Gravitic look to be complete trash due to AV resistances (while Paralytic and Reactive are rarely resisted/viable). Interface seems to be awesome all around for MMs, while fairly blah to everyone else with a few exceptions.

    This was tested as a DM Brute vs Nemesis the AV and later during a Rikti Pylon with Power Analyzer MK III running. Diamagnetic was resisted to the full value of their resistance.
  4. So I'm absolutely surprised nobody's made mention of the Cuda Strike Force, so I'll throw my hat into the ring. A few clarifications on my end first:

    1) If you're not running Relentless on a brute/team, you're doing it wrong.
    2) You're not done until you're out of wakies.
    3) Aggro cap on the last mission of the BSF is guaranteed.
    4) If you've never fought the 5th column, I just want to explain that war wolf bosses one shot almsot everything and shotgunner bosses liquefy most people (they hit hard and aoe).
    5) In the final mission of the BSF, you get ambushed by triple digit 5th Column.
    6) I run a DM/Inv brute.
    7) If you're not chasing your fury bar, you're doing it wrong.

    So the first few missions of the BSF are generally very subpar. Smash Longbow, smash Column, smash more things. In the final mission, AVs notwithstanding, you end up having to fight Reichsman and you're supposed to have a variety of ATs to make your life easier. Specifically, stalkers can go behind forcefields to vaporize dozens of Column at once and dominators can guarantee a hold on said swarms which corruptors can immediately liquefy with their power.

    Obviously, for this story we didn't have a stalker, corruptor, or anything aside from two masterminds, a dom, some SoAs, and me. We engaged Reichsman and about two seconds into the fight, the neverending swarm of Column started coming. I need to express to those that have not done this fight that there are so many mobs, the MAP becomes impassable because column simply clog up the cave entrances. However, with the SoAs and the masterminds we figure we stand a chance so we start fighting.

    The dominator dies immediately as aggro cap bleeds over and makes her paste on the wall. The Shotgun troopers proceed to evaporate the two masterminds, despite aggro cap (from what I've seen, there are tons of bosses and, being relentless, all purple). As one of the masterminds was dark, the other SoA dies immediately. It then comes down to me left and the widow, so we figure we want to give Reichsman a chance and reset him while fighting the literal army of 5th Column. Down at the entrance to the room, the epic battle wages on as both of us are at aggro cap, defense cap, and both possessing a self heal (Aid Self for her, Siphon Life + DP for me). Eventually, she gets unlucky and manages to get Warwolfed with a stray shotgun blast aimed at me.

    Now, defense cap notwithstanding, purple bosses have a substantially higher to hit chance all around. At one point in the fight, I'm forced to pop Unstoppable and I'm -still- taking damage while at resist AND defense cap with two heals. So I'm doing this dance around the lower half of the room, moving near the corpses of all my dead allies (any attempt to stealth is met with clogged tunnels) who I swear were just watching it for the spectacle. During the fight, they feed me with insps to sustain me, greens, blues, oranges, purples, everything. Unstoppable crashes, I smash demonic, glob up purples, and greens to just remain vertical (with a Dark Consumption + DP thrown in). I dip to near blinking red twice, but with my teammates' support I remain standing.

    Half an hour later, everything is dead. I'm a purple richer and on one of the biggest adrenaline rushes I've ever had. At some point during the fight (presumably when the tons of Column had been slaughtered), one of the masterminds was able to wakie and slowly teleport everyone in. It was some of the most fun I've ever had, and some of the comments people made while watching me systematically dismantle an army of Column were hilarious (and sadly, I fail at memory right now). I can only imagine what Reichs was thinking when he saw one brute just obliterate his entire "Might of the Column" nonsense.

    Of course, on the flip side I've been on the receiving end of the RNG screwing me for that fight >.> I swear, RNGs make or break epic scrapperlock stories.
  5. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Fulmens View Post
    I think the answer is, "Heroes were less balanced at the start than villains were at THEIR start". So the best Heroes were a lot better than most villains, which were a lot better than the worst heroes, and people just didn't play the worst heroes.

    There's been a lot of rebalancing, but (for instance) Invulnerability tanks started out with the capability of capping resist and defense to all types except Psi and "untyped" (what toxic started out at) while Ice could cap defense [except for the alpha, where they had mediocre defense to one type and nothing to anything else.]

    Or Dark Armor before stacking armor, where they had (as someone put it) the choice between being beaten to death, or being stunned and beaten to death.

    When City of Villains came out, there were still some pretty bad imbalances. You could get an Energy Brute going and do Assassin Strike level damage in three different places in your attack chain, at a second or two activation time each, while Stalkers were waiting eight seconds with no combat and spending four seconds in activation to do that level of damage once.

    But if you took the best Heroes and the best Villains you came out with better Heroes.

    Also City of Villains has traditionally had tougher opponents. From Arachnos and their "we have SOMETHING you're allergic to" approach, to Longbow and the stacking def debuff/res debuff combo, to getting Carnies from level 30+ instead of 40+ ... they wanted to fix the problem of characters steamrolling trivial content. And they did.

    The problem was that City of Villains and City of Heroes were never all that separate, so you had "City of hard knocks" on one side and "city of creampuffs" on the other, and most people go with the easy option.
    I think Fulmens hits the nail dead on. No offense to anyone on the thread, but for all the talk of not comparing two ATs, it's going to be inevitable. On somewhat similar team set ups (number of support + melee + damage, etc), the heroes are going to universally going to come out on top almost every time by virtue of higher/better numbers. One force field defender does what it takes one or two VEATs to accomplish, or a triple D defender, controllers with containment (and support), as well as both blasters and scrappers obliterating groups. Stalkers and brutes DO have AoE, (brutes to a substantial amount, stalkers on only one powerset) but it'd be up in the air for anything villain side to compete with an archery blaster going full swing. In order for the villains to truly stand on par with heroes, you have to custom rig your team to be an aoe squad of death (Crabs, ELM stalkers, super strength brutes, fire corruptors, etc), whereas heroes at the very least have a little more leeway.

    Between the numbers and certain inherents (i.e. containment), heroes come out inherently stronger on a JUST hero basis. By how much is a big point of contention though.
  6. As a DM/Inv brute that's played since pretty much as far as I can remember brutes being around, I'll say shadow maul is a hit or miss power for most people. When fully purpled out, rocking near 100 global recharge and/or the ability to stack soul drain, SM tends to be the first thing skipped as the ability to cycle your PBAoEs + your targetted far outweigh the two or three seconds mauling.

    There's no doubt it does decent damage, but when you can get something like Dark Obliteration or Ball Lightning to less than ten seconds or, if insane enough, stack soul drain, Shadow Maul kinda loses its luster.

    Personally, I'm not a fan. Dark Melee isn't exactly a powerhouse aoe set and in the time it'd have taken to get a full shadow maul (assuming all the damage hit and none was wasted), a high enough recharge/damage build could've probably ripped a boss a new one. I'd rather be firing off smite/gloom/SL and moving then pinned for three, as dark melee anyways.
  7. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Fury_Flechette View Post
    I like your suggestions but disagree with that one. I leveled a fire/shield scrapper to 50 a while ago and remember very few deaths on her. Shield isn't that great until IO'ed but fire melee makes up for it by pumping out a lot of damage. It is a dangerous build, but not as dangerous as the others you suggested.
    Yea, in all fairness it comes down to the groups you get and your general luck. Joining a group with zero support when you're a somewhat average mitigation wise character and a glass cannon equivalent can be rough. SR and Elec are other options because neither has a heal and the former doesn't kick off until late to early 30s while the latter can be...spotty.

    I'm not trying to say that melee would suit your goals fine, but if you plan on doing quite a bit of teaming or the like, support tends to have a higher lifespan than melee (especially early on) while it changes substantially later on when everything either gets an aoe or the melee in question have protection.
  8. I'd be happy if they gave us the option of having old school disco ball/dark ball of death Invulnerability. I'm in the camp that thought it looked awesome, myself.
  9. I will say that as a sonic/ defender, the biggest thing will be how you've no need or even reason to join in on the fight. It makes sense for a proper "one death only" character, since you shield everyone, turn on the donut, then go sit within max range of dispersion. If you want a real challenge, play an empath that heals with Absorb Pain as opposed to Heal Other or just flat out refuses the latter (Aura + AP + Buffs = skirting death at every turn). If you manage to reach your auras and AB, you stand a substantially larger chance at not dying.

    Melee wise, I can actually tell you a fire/shield scrapper/brute would be fairly dangerous to level, as they tend to get no real mitigation until 22 (True Grit notwithstanding) and survive by simply pumping out as much aggro as they can possibly get, which gets them massive amounts of aggro they usually can't handle. Defense in general suffers extensively until SOs, so you may suffer some early game casualties because of it. Even at end game, an ITF will make a tombstone for any defense based melee that aren't soft capped from buffs/sets.

    If you -really- want to make a near impossible to get to 50 character without dying, I'd suggest a petless mastermind primary matched with Force Field secondary. You'll contribute a good amount from your shields (albeit, nothing like a defender) and can make use of your secondary. If you go thugs, you get dual pistols (so you can act like a proper thug) and can even get gangs of war. You also have zero defenses and the lowest HP in the game. Definitely, a great challenge.
  10. Any idea if the new Martial Arts AS is somewhere? I could've sworn they got one...
  11. [ QUOTE ]
    [ QUOTE ]
    For some reason, Swoop is also qualified as an aoe according to real numbers to boot (...I'm confused at this).

    [/ QUOTE ]

    Gauntlet.





    Your other observations are riddled with misunderstandings. Pain Dom isnt as good as Empathy at some thing because the ATs that get Pain Dom are different from the ATs that get Empathy. All the direct comparisons you've made suffer from this. Bane doesn't do as much damage as X, but has other advantages. For example, Widows single target, single attack burst damage is nothing compared to a bane's Executioner's Strike. Some folks say DPS is king. I say that's a very limited view. Not all missions are either AVs or hordes of exploitable hami mitos.

    EDIT: (On an unrelated note, the idea of hordes of people with level 50 characters who have never fought anything with them but mitos that CANNOT ATTACK BACK is frightening to me.)

    [/ QUOTE ]

    Excuse me what? I made a comparison of Pain Domination and Thermal, both of which are shared by an AT. I should point out that Thermal and Empathy are shared by an AT as well and both are equally competitive. Thermal blows Pain out of the water with reliable resists from shields, reliable +damage from Forge, massive debuff in heat exhaustion, arguably the best rez in the game, and a targettable debuff that doesn't require a squishy corruptor to get into melee. Meh.

    Also, you may want to check your math. Judging by real numbers in game, using Arachnos Soldier and Arachnos Widow as the ATs respectively, Slash does 2 ticks of 76.31 damage with a 101.75 crit. Shatter does 126.79 damage plus 84.53 smashing on a crit and 5 ticks of 4.17 damage. Basic rudimentary math would tell us that Slash (a Widow Skill) does a total of 254.37 damage while Shatter (i.e. Executioner Strike) does 232.17. Not only do widows do more damage, they animate faster in their attack (insignificant point). This is while running around and soft capping their team with mind link (or close enough) and being soft capped themselves.

    Yes, DPS may be king but it's not exactly something banes shine in either, apparently.
  12. [ QUOTE ]
    Only going to adress the ones I have experience with~

    I'm going to have to just disagree entirely about Brute's /Shield secondary. The fury they make puts them on pretty equal footing with scrapper damage, and they can achieve tanker level mitigation and have tanker level HP. If anything, they are the *best* of both worlds, for anything you do ever. Brutes don't have any smaller an endurance bar than any other archetype either. A well built /SD brute can demolish nearly anything with extreme zeal.

    Also, I've only ever played Dark Blast on a defender, but I felt the main focus on this set was that it was more mitigation oriented. You trade a bit of damage for that. Granted, my Dark Blast was paired with /kin, so what do I know about vanilla damage?

    Broadsword, the way it was explained to me, does better damage the first 5-10 seconds of a new enemy. After that time has elapsed, Katana will take the lead in damage. That's the basic difference between 'burst' and 'damage over time.' Whether or not you prefer one type of damage to another is totally your opinion, but broadsword doesn't perform worse, just differently.

    Broadsword and Battle Axe have the same number of AOE's. Yes, Headsplitter is an AOE as well, and once you start using it as such, becomes very devestating. Battle Axe's AOE's do hit more enemies however. Battle Axe is also regulated to Brutes and Tankers, which have a lower multiplier for damage, meaning Broadsword is doing more damage as of right now until you start factoring in Rage. Even then, burst sets like battle axe are very difficult to take advantage of on a brute, who gains more fury by attacking quickly. I don't know how to math Battle Axe into a scrapper form, but as it is right now, Broadsword does better damage overall.

    It also seems odd to mention sets that are performing well unless you take away a power. I mean, I could take RttC out of willpower and say willpower is underpowered like that, but it'd be kind of silly to do so since it isn't how the game is actually working.

    [/ QUOTE ]

    I will point out that without severe IOing, brute shield defense is nowhere near as effective as tanker, simply because they have scrapper numbers for all their powers. It takes several million (if not a billion or more) plus heavy sacrifices in terms of powers/sets to defense cap a brute shield defense, This and the fact that AAO gives a smaller return to brutes (10 vs 12.5 on a scrapper) and that Shield Charge is capped at 300% damage (something that all three will reach with ease, but wastes 500% more damage from a brute) makes the strength of SD much more questionable in the hands of a brute.

    Now, I do understand that using Battle Axe and Broadsword in comparison seems hard to do because they're split across ATs, but realize that all of the base weapon sets (Katana, War Mace, Broadsword, and Battle Axe) are balanced across near identical powers. Using Scrapper or Brute numbers on virtually every power makes Battle Axe win out on equivalent abilities for raw damage save for Whirling Sword/Axe and Head Splitter/Cleave (and Cleave comes close). Swoop, a level 8 ability, sends Disembowel home crying. For some reason, Swoop is also qualified as an aoe according to real numbers to boot (...I'm confused at this). If I wanted burst I'll go pick up fire melee for ridiculous damage. Yes, parry is a deal maker in BS, but I question the overall usefulness of a set when fighting anything that you can't two shot (which is most high end content). Note that I'm looking at base numbers for all this in real numbers (use the [Power Name] and click on the names), so I'm not taking fury and crits into account either.

    [ QUOTE ]


    From reading all this, i come to the conclusion that you only do not like the "flavor" of these powersets. Because other than that i find nothing wrong with all the powersets you talked above. They are all working powersets and not underperforming. They may not be the best powersets for any given situations but they also all have their quirks and their advantages.

    Broadsword underperforming? Come on... Who here will seriously claim that broadsword is not getting the job done? You prefer katana? Well good for you but you can't use katana with a shield like i do. And when Headsplitter does a critical hit, it hits harder than Golden Dragonfly critical. Both are great powersets btw. But theyre slightly different and that is why i like them both.

    [/ QUOTE ]

    I adore the flavor of the Peacebringer and the Bane, but the sets themselves are on the low end of the totem pole. Same with things like dark blast and shield defense on corruptors and brutes specifically. Their advantages are few and far between when compared to all equivalent choices which tends to be the definition of underperforming.

    Dark Blast, for example, is overshadowed completely by the fact that Radiation Emission, Dark Miasma, and Force Field can either tohit debuff an enemy to the cap or defense buff a team to the gills before even taking into account Dark Blast. Sure you can use them against AVs, but dark blast gets utterly destroyed debuff wise as well. Storm can tohit debuff cap too if you just walk in with a hurricane on. The damage is easily on the low end of the totem pole for defenders, but as has been said, you don't take it for its damage but for its mitigation. This is only made worse on corruptors who have lower debuff numbers by comparison, but can arguably do very good damage with scourge. Even still in terms of mitigation, ice offers plenty in terms of holds and slows, psi, rad, sonic AR and archery all offer forms of reliable control, and all of the aforementioned novas either have extremely good control or do incredible damage in comparison. The only leg Dark Blast has over any blast sets is arguably electric blast and energy blast, putting it near the bottom if not equivalent. I've never once argued that dark blast excels as a mitigation set, but unless you're constantly taking alphas to apply debuffs and tossing out three or four aoes (which you need to stack the debuffs), the mitigation won't be there.

    I never once called any of the powersets unplayable, I called them underperforming. Pain will be outhealed and outdone by both thermal and empathy, banes/peacebringers will be outdamaged/out controlled/out hybrided by most ATs, and Shield Defense doesn't bring anywhere the same amount of utility as fiery aura/energy aura/super reflexes for a brute and arguably less survivability between all three, two of which get a heal and one of which becomes near godlike at high levels.

    And what power sets did I take something away from? That line kinda confused me.

    Edit: I just realized what was meant. Super Strength and Stone Armor as a whole underperform because they NEED one power to be useful. While most sets can operate fully without some keystone powers, albeit somewhat worse off (like kins without SB, Miasma without DN, SR without passives, etc) SS and SA are practically unplayable if not downright pathetic without Rage and Granite. WP with Tough and Weave can still achieve very high levels of Smash/Lethal, I believe, letting them still live for a long time (before even considering their naturally high HP), same with Invuln lacking Invincibility.
  13. The one thing I do want to point out is that people need to separate the terms accuracy and tohit. Accuracy raises the overall floor of the mob's hitting capabilities (i.e. a higher level mob or one with more accuracy raises the floor from 5% to, say, 6-10%) while Tohit is directly opposed to Defense.
  14. I'll add a few power sets to the list I all around don't much care for or find underperforming as well.

    First and top of the list are Peacebringers. Before the Kheld enthusiasts come out in arms, I want to state that PBs (human and tri) are capable of doing quite a few things, but are often completely overshadowed by Warshades and most other ATs in the game. They suffer a horrid case of the explosive knockbacks and their damage can be replicated, if not completely trounced, by anything not a defender or tanker (and both of those are arguable). A fully purpled out PB can nuke every other spawn or toss out some good nova damage, but they're just all around lack luster to a degree of "meh."

    Next on the list comes the Bane Spider. In both the short term and the long term, the one advantage they arguably have over their siblings is surveillance, which is completely overshadowed by the fact that both crabs and widows obliterate their aoe and single target damage respectively, and fortunata outcontrol the snot out of them. They're as fragile as a blapper and do nowhere near the damage (and blasters get surveillance and power boost to boot). While they do possess killing power, it tends to pale in the face of, again, anything else that can do substantial amounts of damage. The only exception is a heavily purpled out bane that will still underperform when compared to a heavily purpled crab that's a monstrous killing machine or a heavily purpled widow that runs around soft cap and tossing out crazy damage anyways.

    Shield Defense is the next on the list and this one's a bit iffy. Tanker Shield Defense is actually a pretty decent, if not good, set because their numbers are fairly high and the damage values and shield charge really do give a boost for the low damage AT. Scrappers get some serious love from Against All Odds and Shield Charge makes the mans fall down. Brutes, however, get the worst of both worlds (horrid defense numbers, low AAO) and their shield charge is capped at tanker values. This means that not only is the set difficult to cap when compared to SR, Shield Charge doesn't actually mature past 300% as far as I remember. Add on the crippling end usage for a brute which already suffers from endurance dysfunction and you have a much worse copy of Super Reflexes and even Energy Aura (which now has a good energy absorption and a much, much, much better tier 9) and it's arguably the worst brute secondary around. Sure you can purple it out, but expect to spend ridiculous amounts compared to anything short of EA.

    Pain Domination is another doozy that's just all around a disappointing version of Empathy. There is very little to the set I feel that actually contributes fully to a group and can't be replicated elsewhere. Gone are three of empathy's most useful tools (the Auras and Fortitude) replaced with an aura that replicates Thermal Shields except PBAoE. Gone is Adrenalin Boost instead replaced by a more tame Painbringer that trades the 100 recharge (why?!) with damage. Anguishing Cry gets notable mention for being a near direct copy of Melt Armor except PBAoE and lasts less time. So Pain is a mix of Thermal and Empathy without much of the sets awesome abilities (Forge, Fortitude, the Auras, Heat Exhaustion) that will be easily outperformed by both in any and all situations. The one exception to this statement is the awesome that is Suppress Pain on a Mastermind, which is a suitable replacement to Regeneration Aura. Corruptors get left out in the cold, of course.

    Next up on the list is Dark Blast. Having absolutely no tier 3 blast, the set is very plainly cone/aoetastic. What's worse is that most of those cones tend to be overshadowed by anything that has actual aoe damage, leading to a situation where Dark Blast possess one or two useful cones, a self heal, and gloom/dark blast. Toss in a really bad looking tier nine (I just can't get over how terrible it looks, it's like a thunderous fart) and you come out with a vanilla set that does terrible damage and is only worthwhile in the hands of a defender. Yes, obliterating the tohit of a spawn is good and useful, but you may as well have two secondaries. Also, kiss your personal damage goodbye.

    This one's going to be confusing, but I also feel Broadsword is a giant underperforming pile of garbage compared to every other weapon set (excluding claws). Yes, it does a large amount of damage, but this is completely overshadowed by the fact that battle axe does more numerically and has more aoe to boot. What's worse is that with IOs and slotting, or even without, Katana puts Broadsword to shame in the damage, end efficiency, and all around use categories. Parry, its only saving grace, is replicated in Divine Avalanche which just further rubs Broadsword's nose in the dirt. There's better sets for doing damage (especially ludicrously high amounts of damage) and better sets for survivability that don't make you suck down end like it's going out of style. Meh.

    Honorable mention goes out to Super Strength, as was mentioned earlier, and Stone Armor. Both of these sets suffer from a horribly crippling crutch (Rage and Granite) that, if taken away or balanced will leave each set a floundering and bad shadow of virtually everything else in existence. Kinetics gets a pass because while Speed Boost and Fulcrum Shift are indeed pieces of awesome, Transference, Transfusion, Siphon Speed, and Increase Density are all lovable and huggable pieces of awesome too.
  15. [ QUOTE ]
    [ QUOTE ]
    Here is a simple thought that basically keeps the benefit defenders are getting roughly the same but applies it a bit more evenly - give defenders a base end reduction that scales up for every member on thier team, kinda like the HEAT benefits. Maybe something like a 10% global end reduction all the time so they get SOME solo benefit and then an addition bonus (2%-5% say) per team member, regardless of the health of the team.

    This gives the defender some benefit when solo and encourages teaming without giving more benefits to any one type of defender. It also has the benefit of being similar to an existing system (the HEAT benefits that accrue based on teammate AT) so that there is likely to be existing code that could be adapted.

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    Any vigilence "solution" that forces a defender to have different slotting based on team size is not good. It's similar to tying Blaster/Scrapper damage to team size, Tanker defenses to team size, or Controller mez durations to team size. These are all things the devs could do if they wanted to force people into teaming rather than to continue to allow solo viability.

    Kheldian Cosmic Balance has similar problems but at least it doesn't mess with how well (or not) your slotting works.

    [/ QUOTE ]

    I should point out that Assassination also works off team size and works very well at that, arguably better then Critical Hit from Scrapper. Make Vigilance along those lines.

    Example: Keep the current mechanic where the lower the team is getting, the higher chance this has to happen (including the defender in the max) with a base chance of, say, 10% (same as Stalker). As the team % gets lower, it increments upwards 1% for every average % of life lost on the team. When it activates, the target gets a "Vigilant" (power boosted) buff or debuff that also functions off the blasts too.

    This gives something for everyone and means that the stronger sets with toggles, rad and dark, won't get the crits out of their stronger debuffs (the toggles) but can still get it off their blasts or click uses. Empaths get crit heals and things like force field will be encouraged to reapply buffs to get a bigger buff (albeit randomly) on their team, as well as their blasts.

    The only ones that get moderately hosed are archery users, though TA's would get away like bandits.
  16. Played my sonic/sonic corruptor today and I did the cape mission. In the mission where you have to destroy the contraband, the sonic blasts were hitting a point up and about two feet away from a corner of the box.
  17. When using the Revive Ally dayjob power, instead of pulling the device out and waving it over the body, my character leans over like the beginning of a nuke and repeats the motion while the device hovers in the air. May happen with Resuscitate as well (I remember something like that happening when my controller used it)

    Brute with Revive Ally: Dark Melee/Invuln
    Controller: Illusion/Kinetics

    edit: Posted wrong thing on wrong thread
  18. I should point out that the aforementioned sets that everyone has a problem with, Empathy and Force Field, aren't exactly sunshine and rainbows to solo on a controller either. Earth and Illusion would bite the big one with their low damage (or in the latter, near inability to achieve constant containment), while some like Plant Control and Ice Control sit squarely in the middle with some form of constant containment.

    It bears repeating that the uber and stronger sets, namely rad, sonic, dark, and probably cold, consistently obliterate solo content including, but not limited to, giant monsters. Now, in the high end, the difference between troller and defender damage becomes much more noticeable, but it's also at these times when teams most benefit from the harder to solo set (Force Field defense capping an entire team by themselves or near it? Yes please) that the only reason you'd solo is because you're not wanting to be in a team.

    From 1-20, containment is okay/decent and hard to get consistently due to low recharge, running out of end, missing, or a combination of other things. Once containment really hits the flow and the aoe immobs are constantly up, or holds can be double or triple stacked is when controller damage shoots past defenders.

    As for vigilance, all hero ATs were designed without inherents and most of the ones in place, save scrapper, are either horribly underwhelming or overpowered. Brutes get mini punchvoke for free and still have taunt auras and fury (and hold aggro more then well enough) and the corruptor's scourge is much more noticeable then a defender's vigilance.

    On my TA/A, I've never felt like I've been negligent to my team's safety because I was still applying my debuffs and nuking like mad with vigilance kicking in as someone inevitably got hurt. Force Field fenders not getting boosts because the entire team isn't getting hurt? This very likely means your team is either sitting around doing nothing or steamrolling. I'll gladly blast at full end because everything is already dying, so no big deal either way.
  19. [ QUOTE ]

    Malta don't have a problem with supers per se, just uncontrolled supers, such as our characters. The group was formed by intelligence agents in charge of meta-human operations, after the Might for Right act was overturned. So they're used to supers working for them.

    Being a member of the Knives might count as "under control." Then again, we are never told why Indigo left, iirc.

    Edit: According to ParagonWiki, Indigo is a mutation origin contact. Eeeeenteresting.


    [/ QUOTE ]

    That actually raises further questions, specifically what qualifies as "Uncontrolledl?" Some heroes are part of government recognized organizations and have some limits or rules about their powers while others (PCs) are likely free agents. Another point to bring up is that Malta constantly stress that all their members are fully human, bots and technology notwithstanding, and Slingers are the pride of everyone because they can take down a super.

    As for the mutant entry in ParagonWiki, that comes from the fact that she sells Mutant Enhancements (Crimson's in there too). Likewise, they show up in MA contacts as Mutation, but then so does Amanda Loomis who is very much not a mutant. It's just confusing all around.
  20. I've got two questions in this, so I'll list them and the research I've found.

    1) Are Agent Indigo, Shadow Spider, and Agent Crimson Mutants?

    We know that both Agent Indigo and Shadow Spider were originally Knives of Artemis and they each have the exact same abilities. However, Indigo's biography states that she can see the future and Crimson's states that he has super human reflexes. Does all this come from just being exceptionally well trained or is it mutated?

    2) Do the Knives of Artemis and the Malta Operatives accept mutants and/or supers into their ranks?

    Assuming Indigo's premonitions come from mutant powers, we would know that the Knives recruited a mutant into their ranks (perhaps unwittingly). We also know that Malta Operatives work with the Knives often, and Malta are known to not have any particular fondness to metahumans or supers in general. Logically, Knives containing supers or mutants would cause a schism between them and the Malta, hurting their working relationship, thus the question.
  21. [ QUOTE ]
    [ QUOTE ]
    ...The only AOE kb powers I can think of are Thunder Clap and Hand Clap, which both have situational use. It would be an outright buff to make either of those powers KD, and neither of them is in a set that remotely needs a buff.

    [/ QUOTE ]

    My PB's Solar Flare power has irritated a tanker or two. Basically a Footstomp clone with cooler visuals, but does KB instead of KD. It's a power that most PBs use...alot. Yes, I can position myself on the edge of a mob, preferably on the opposite side of a wall, or wait for 'Lockdown'. Another tactic I do alot is wait for another teammate or two to do their AoEs before doing mine - people don't mind KB as much when the flying foes are dead.

    It would be sorta cool if there was a way to 'change at will' KB into KD, though...

    [/ QUOTE ]

    Playing as my kin, I find grouping with some PBs maddening. One I tend to group with often runs human only and has no option for the knockbacks. Often, they'll wait until I fulcrum shift to start laying in, but if my FS is on cooldown or quite a bit of damage is coming in, knockback happens and there goes any chance to drop an immediate shift or even heal/transference myself.

    That being said, I rather like knockback, but hate sets with a near uncontrollable amount of knockback (like the PB footstomp for example).
  22. The Zig Prison Zone

    I must say though, I'm biased >.>

    More love to the non burst based ATs or giving some sort of ability to those ATs villain side that suffer in team based combat.