Kinslayer_

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We are also always on the look for more people to join the Darklords, we've finally managed to establish a pretty active VG with a large fully working base...Currently we have about 70 members, so would have to check to see if theres room or not.

Also it makes no difference to us weather your a r/p'er or not or if your new or not, all are welcome (only rule is not to pester the higher lvls for PL'in...happy to team up but dont expect an easy ride )

If ya intrested send a message to either @Dark Bru or @Chin, can generally find us on most evenings and would be happy to answer any questions you may have.

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Well, I've teamed with a few of Bru's guys and chat to him on the leader channel and they've always been good people to team with so you can't go wrong there really

Well, there is a pretty big RP VG out there. Can't remember what it's called though(something like EVIL, but not E.V.I.L who are a seperate VG)

I would offer you spot in my VG but, like many of the well established ones, It's a bit quiet at the moment as everyone waits for I7 and we have no active players in the lower levels.

There's a related thread HERE that you may want to look at with tips on how to pick a VG.

One thing I will say, don't give into the temptation to join one you see advertised over broadcast. You don't know the playters, they don't know you. These groups typically have little idea of how a real SG should function and are only interested in getting members to bump their prestige up.

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That was Hurricane.

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Gah, me being a tit. I automatically read 'hurricane' whenever I see Whirlwind as I can't beleive people actually whirlwind

It does prevent AS, the nerf wasn't to that but to do with the fact they can just pin players to the wall in base raids.

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Ice/Cold Corr.

-regen in Benumb (I think) and a hell of a lot of slows so they can really only use their clicky heals once in a fight.

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I'm with Lady on this.

One of my main PvP alts is an ice/ice Corruptor and I love fighting spine/regen in one on one. Their typical reaction to a one on one from a corruptor is to snigger but they're quite easy to beat with that particular build.

Snow Storm along with swift/SS is quite key as you just drop this on them to keep them well back out of range. Spam away with benumb, infrigidate, sleet and fill the gaps with your freeze ray hold and normal ice attacks.

As long as you survive the initial onslaught and don't get too close, it's just a matter of time before you bring them to such a grinding halt it's then down to patience(and good end management) before you break their mez protection or chip away enough HP for them to drop.

It's not an 'always win' situation but it's always very close

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Works well against any regen due to the amount of clickys....

However if the spines regen happens to have tp then you are toast

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Nah, had a tank try that against me the other day and the animation on it is so slow that you can just moved back out of range as soon as you see the flash of white.

Actually found it funny against the tank when he was trying it and I just danced back out of range before he had even rematerialised and hit him again

Yay, got the badge

Cheers to Welsh for having me along. Was a lot quicker than I guessed it would be and I'd estimate it took us 3 hours total over the two nights.

A 7/8 man team will spawn 3 bosses per run and their are a few Tsoo Sorcerors and Ancestor Spirits as well for those two badges

I'll be about with Kinslayer again. Was actually quite surprised at how much progress we made last night(considering how hard it is to get) and should be able to clear it in just two more sittings

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Ice/Cold Corr.

-regen in Benumb (I think) and a hell of a lot of slows so they can really only use their clicky heals once in a fight.

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I'm with Lady on this.

One of my main PvP alts is an ice/ice Corruptor and I love fighting spine/regen in one on one. Their typical reaction to a one on one from a corruptor is to snigger but they're quite easy to beat with that particular build.

Snow Storm along with swift/SS is quite key as you just drop this on them to keep them well back out of range. Spam away with benumb, infrigidate, sleet and fill the gaps with your freeze ray hold and normal ice attacks.

As long as you survive the initial onslaught and don't get too close, it's just a matter of time before you bring them to such a grinding halt it's then down to patience(and good end management) before you break their mez protection or chip away enough HP for them to drop.

It's not an 'always win' situation but it's always very close

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Yup, disappointing upcome, but that was one hell of a fight. Great fun, altho the learning part wasn't really fulfilled. More people join next week! :P

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Aye I hope we can develop villain strategies next week... but I think I'll allow WBG to fight instead
of Dust - Doctor Dust

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lol, don't know why. DD was a real pain in there and in a bigger team situation, could cause real problems

Just wondering if anyone can shed light on how rep works?

I was up to 98.1 on Monday and knew it would drop a little overnight. Went back on today and even after a kill or two, I checked and it was down to 94.

I heard it dropped 1 point per day but this is clearly wrong as mine must have dropped around 8 points in a 24 hour period.

I'm guessing it must drop faster, the higher it is?

OK, first night out of the way.

Numbers were down a bit due to a certain patch on Test but it was a good session for those of us who were there.

Had a particularly good 2 on 2 with Doctor Dust, Beta Module and Kosmos.

hope to see more people there next week as we certainly learnt a few things and had a few good questions raised.

Well, I'll be heading over around 19.00.

I would love to get this one on Kinslayer but I thought it was near impossible to get?

The only method I've heard of for getting it is to farm the lvl 20 cape mission and even then it's pretty random that any outcasts turn up, with only 3 or 4 per run expected?

Any chance you can just post a few details on how you'll be getting it and also, could you confirm how many are needed for the badge?

OK, first one of these is tomorrow.

I'm hoping we get a good turnout and these can carry on as a weekly event, with a view to joining in the Test server nights once we have a bit more experience

Where to start

- Having to rely on a specific build
While this isn't a huge problem for me, that's only because I play a lot and can afford the luxury of high lvl PvE and PvP builds. There are a lot of people out there who can't have dedicated builds and it really is unfair on them having to decide between being good at one or the other.

- Attitudes/lack of respect in PvP zones
Goes without saying, their are some real assclowns frequenting this zone. For example, there was a Blapper in Sirens last night complaining about the villains outnumbering them over broadcast and how bad ganking was. What really got me about this was that the same blapper was there 24 hours earlier happily ganking the villains who were outnumbered 5 to 1. Ganking, flaming, arrogance, DELIBERATELY interfering in duels, DELIBERATELY attacking the spectators(if you're that much of a PvP god, why not just wait the 2 minutes a duel takes then prove your worth fairly cowards) all of these put most players in the game off PvP.

- Debt
Been debated over and over but IMO, debt and XP have no place in a PvP zone

- Badges
Bet you're wondering about this one! The majority of badgehunters aren't huge PvP fans and the majority of PvP'ers aren't massive badgehunters. Yes, there are a lot of exceptions but that's the general trend. So, why force people who don't like PvP to go in there, who then moan over broadcast when they're killed. Just doesn't make sense to me that one. Forcing these two conflicting breeds into confrontation can only end with the weaker species horrifically injured

- Balance
Considering the way PvP 'balance' has turned the PvE side of the game into a pale shadow of it's former self, it amazes me how badly balanced it still is.

- Base Cost
For me, bases are one of the more fun areas of PvP as they don't takes as much skill as arena where movement is key. Despite this, they are the most difficult part of PvP to get involved in because of the ridiculous costs involved.

- Whinging About Stalkers
I don't play one but I do get sick of the 'coward' shouts whenever someone is killed by AS. The claims that 'you couldn't beat me without AS' just make me laugh. Of course they coulnd't, but neither could a tank win without toggles, controllers couldn't win without holds. They were designed that way and it may be overpowered but that's a seperate issue and stalkers are easy to counter with the right build.

- Bases
Make them safe zones where you can't damage or be damaged. Don't make them zones that the other side can use to actually inflict debt on you with the ridiculous number of turrets and turn an even battle completely in their favour. My best battles in PvP have always been in the centre of the zone and the minute they end up at either base, it just becomes frustrating.

- Zone Sizes
Not sure if this puts me of or not but it is something that can be improved. I just find the zones a little too small. Sirens is a prime example where battles take place in only one of three real areas of the map, heroe base, villain base or that little stretch of road in the middle. A zone on a par with IP in size would really spice things up IMO

- The Numbers Game
I don't think anyone, other than those quite shallow people, can say they enjoy it when a zone is completely one sided. Outnumbering the opposition 5 to 1 is boring and frustrating when it's the other way around. I'd almost like to see the game spanw multiple instances of the zone and put new players in different instances based on the number of each side in that instance currently to keep it balanced(I know there are obvious flaws with this idea, I just can't think of a more sophisticated way of doing it)

Lol, made an idiot of myself again. I only stumbled across it just before I left work and the first posts I read where the ones saying villains were much better in 'non pentad' matches.

Jusrt scanning through it now, I can see they're soon shouted down by the rest of the communities mocking tones.

Just found a couple of interesting posts on the US forums about this.

Think a few people are going to be surprised at some of the views over there as they seem quite different to the ones over here.

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showf...t=all&vc=1

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showf...t=all&vc=1

First off, NEVER accept a blind SG invite. Chances are that it could evolve into a good SG but it's a lot more likely to be full of people you have nothing in common with and who are just getting you in there to generate prestige.

Personally, my VG will not recruit people we've not teamed with and even when they do come in, they're on a trial basis to make sure they aren't going to cause problems.

The simplest way is to get around lvl 15 without an SG and just see who you're teaming with regularly. If they don't have a VG, suggest you form one between yourselves or ask if you can join the VG they're in. This seems to be a lot harder on CoV than CoH as the quality of teams at the low levels is so bad.

There are several good VG's out there though and you'll find the same names popping up on the forums. My VG is in colaition with The Horde and E.V.I.L and I can recomend both of those.

Also, my own VG would always be interested in new members but I dodn't like recruiting people under false pretences so I'll be honest with our set up.

- We have over 20 lvl 40's in the VG and about another 30 people who are lvl 30+. We are a little inactive at lower levels currently

- We have a very strict 'no alt' policy for the main VG. We found ourselves getting a few too many alts in that was filling the VG so we have a seperate VG for alts. There is also a new 'experimental' PvP only branch of the VG, so all tastes should be catered for across the three seperate VG's.

- Coalitions. We're lucky to be in coalition with most of the bigger VG's out there and a quick yell over coaliion chat will normally find you a team.

- We don't really have any RP'ers.

- We don't pressure people to play in VG mode. Obviously it is preferable and there's no reason not to play in VG mode until lvl 24 when the inf penalty kicks in but we never put people under pressure to do so. Those who are earning prestige are more likely to get promotions though. We have plenty of inf floating around the VG and people are happy to hand it out to those earning mony to improve the base. Inf should NEVER be a problem and if it is, I will find it for you.

- Respecs and TF's happen pretty regulalry. Not sure if anoyne in the VG has actually done a respec without me bringing my main along and if people want to do anything, they have the luxury of just telling me which TF/respec, when they want to do it and that's it, knowing full well I'll take care of the rest and make sure they have a team, even if I can't join myself. It's not that I'm a busybody, just that the rest of my VG are lazy and no I'll do it for them!

- Base-wise, we're doing pretty well. We have a fully raid capable base with TP machines covering all zones, we have a full medical facility with the insp vendor, workshop, VG computer to allow the VG specific SF and several base defences. The base is also designed to make raid defences as easy as possible. We're one of the top prestige earning groups on Union and there are really only 2 or 3 groups i'm aware of that are bigger than us.

- We play for fun. We're not here to be 'the uber VG', we don't take PL beggars or put pressure on members to take part in events but we do organise them quite a bit. Banter on SG chat and our global channel is plentiful and we're not a dictatorship. I've not met a single SG/VG that gives out the rank privileges we do, with most running a strictly regimented system. Ours does not rely on not giving people set access levels to stuff, just in case they do need access for some reason and no one is on, but relies on trust and the fact we all get on and wouldn't do something silly!

- I am NOT the leader. Yes, I se the SG up and I do arrange most of the TF's/respecs/events etc but every member of the groups opinon is valued and we do not tell people 'the SG says you should do this'

- The entire VG are responsible for recruitment. the only time you do not have SG invite access is when you're on the trial period. This usually only lasts a couple of days. After that, we want you to invite people you've teamed with and had a good time with. Doesn't matter if they are good players as the more experienced members are always on hand to help.

It's not all good though. Most members of the group are now quite high in lvl so finding new members is proving a little tough for us. As a result, a lot are off on CoH or alting while waiting for I7 but that's why we have our global channel set up. The good part of this is that any low levels joining really can add a lot by identifying and recruiting new members.

I think I may have had a chat with you in Port Oakes last night?

If you are interested, send me a tell on @kinlsayer or PM me here and our VG name is Bloodline for the main, Blood Pack for the alt one, Last Legion Of Destruction for the PvP one and we also have the New Blood Rebellion SG on CoH.

Either way, hope you find a VG that suits you. There are some bad ones out there but there are also some real gems as well

Got a couple of reasons for not doing it on test.

- Quite a few of those turning up are new to PvP or inexperienced, especially in arena terms.

- Many of those probably don't have test set up

I'm sure some of the more experienced players will turn up on Wednesday as well and once I've got a few sessions out of the way, I will be joining the test sessions. For now, I think a couple of very basic warm ups are needed before we even understand and appreciate what we should be trying to get out of test!

That said, I will copy my main PvE toon over to test and respec him for PvP so I can at least have a little try out.

A couple of us have been discussing the lack of real PvP teamwork and understanding of min/max principles on CoV.

As a result, we're going to get a few people together on a regular Tuesday night basis to try different things out.

The format is simple enough, turn up at the Port Oakes arena anytime from 19.00 onwards. The first few sessions will involve a bit of testing so we'll be forming different teams form the various members who are there to test out different combinations. Simple things like a debuff pentad team against a buff pentad team. A damage heavy team against a defence heavy team, a balanced team against a min/max team etc.

We'll be concentrating on things like keeping the stalker buffed for one fight to keeping the brute buffed for the next and so on. These won't be real competitive matches but more an experimental workshop for the first few weeks.

Once each session is over, everyone taking part is encouraged to post here with what they think worked or didn't work.

Once they've been running a few weeks, we should then have a feel for the best builds to complement each other and can start getting a little bit more competitive and start pushing each other with specific team make ups.

Hope to see you all there.

On a seperate note and back to some of the questions raised. It seems that, yes I am being a fart brain when talking about SR(Super Reflexes). I thought both Ice Armour and SR were Resistance based sets?

For example, if we were to take a RES based stalker for a pentad team, what should we be doing as a team to use him most effectively in order of priority?

- Buff his damage
- Buff his ACC
- Buff his RES
- Buff his defence
- Debuff his targets defence
- Debuff his targets RES
- Debuff his targets damage
- Debuff his targets ACC

My gut reaction is to buff his defence as he already has RES so you can get a balance but from what I've seen and the fact min/maxing plays such a big part, i'm guessing i'm completely wrong?

Then there are all the other buffs and debuffs such as invis and end buffs, slows etc.

I'm guessing a */Thermal is probably the most useful in a pentad for the shields, heals, buffs and debuffs?

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and kin.. what? are u saying i dot know anything about PvP? then that must mean u know it all, to be able to make that judgment.. and even as i asked u for suggestions and advices, u act as if u where friendly, when u really laughed at me behind my back?

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I have no idea where that has come from and if anyone can say where I've said Dr. Deatrh has no knowledge, please do as my post clearly states the 'Union Leader' channel, not 'Dr. Death'.

I was NOT referring to Dr Death but was referring to a general conversation that went on for several hours last night among a most of the VG leaders on this channel.

Any suspicion of a personal attack on Dr. Death is ENTIRELY imagined. Death, you are being over sensitive due to recent criticisms levelled at you and I think i'm actually telling people NOT to turn this thread into a flamewar.

Everyone, stop it now and take this thread back to what it was about.

I think our chats on the Leader channel tonight definitely showed a lot of holes in our general PvP min/max knowledge.

One thing that did come up was the RES vs DEF question and also the value of -ACC powers.

For arena team PvP, where should our buffs/debuffs be concentrated? -DEF -ACC +DEF +RES, balanced.

Overall opinion seemd to be go with RES heavy sets such as SR and concentrate on +DEF and +DMG buffs for our team. Chances are this is wrong though so any feedback appreciated.

(Please just leave the flaming. We've seen enough of it lately and I think people have all said their piece in other posts. No need to carry it on)

For me, stalkers and Corruptors are the key to PvP for villains and MM's are, at present, a liability in PvP zones and arena.

In a simple 5 on 5, I think a villain team can do well against heroes with a bit more practice, just not in pentad.

As for Blasters Vs Corruptors. I've noticed this as well. I know blasters do have a higher damage output than corruptors but it seems to be a LOT higher than it should be with blasters able to tear through Corruptors in seconds.

My main theory on that is that Defiance may be a little overpowered in PvP, compared to PvE where it is little use whatsoever. The end of '1 shot kills' could make the ability to 'play' with Defiance a lot easier as well. Also, Blaster secondaries are vastly different to Corruptor ones in that they can make Blappers while Corruptors can't. Toggle dropping blasters are one of the biggest threats in PvP for me as travel toggle drop = faceplant.

When it comes to dominators, you're really looking at both sides of what you said. A good Dominator is GREAT in a team situation. IMO, dominators are much better at aggro management than MM's or Brutes in teams where there are lots of enemies as the holds make a huge difference... As long as the Dom doesn't take the alpha.

Bigger teams also allow Dom's to fire up Domination quicker and that really does make a difference. Unfortunately, they are notoriously hard to solo with from 10-30.

A Dom relies on a team but is also very beneficial to one.

Cold secondary has a couple of shields in it, a grant dull pain move and some very good debuffs. Snow Storm is a toggle/anchor AoE and dropped on a mob, slows them down like caltrops. The main difference being they can't actually escape it like caltrops as it follows the anchor, rather than being area specific, also drops fly. Infrigidate is one of the best powers in the set and is available at the beginning as it drops recharge on all powers and can bring AV's to a standstill in terms of attacks. Benumb is available quite late on but is probably one of the best debuffs around.

Thermal is a bit of a slow starter, the three key powers in it are all available at the end of the set. However, the two heals are probably the most user friendly as they're one of the few that do not rely on enemies in CoV. The two shields are OK as well. Thaw is probably the best anti mez buff on CoV as well. The three key powers at the end are the jewels in the crown though. Forge is pretty much identical to Fortitude and slapping one of these on a brute in full flow will see him cut through mobs like they aren't there, especially if his rage is up. Heat Exhaustion is a single target debuff and very powerful. Melt Armour is the final power and is an AoE DEF debuff. Any brute loves having a thermal along for forge, shields and heals.

In terms of primaries, Ice and Fire also happen to be the two most damaging ones. Ice is a bit of an end chewer and reasonably slow on recharge while Fire has a lot of AoE or cone ones and some quite short range attacks. The other thing Ice has in it's favour as a primary are a couple of single target holds and the -slow on it's attacks. stcked up with the secondary of ice it is devastating in stopping enemies attacking.