Kruunch

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I just realized that i would switch a couple hink...take combat jump and SJ and acrobats and then i would just take hasten.

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Don't take Acrobatics ... grab a -KB IO or two instead.

I've seen a lot of builds lately without a travel power. Raptor Packs are a very cost effective way of being able to skip a power if you really need/want to.

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I'm with Aett, hasten is overrated, especially for inv/ss. Heraclea has a pretty good looking build there, though.

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I can't think of anything in the game that I wouldn't rather be doing 70% faster.

/boggle

Try this current thread: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat....=0#Post13656948

It's an ongoing discussion so if you have any questions you might want to ask in there.

Takes a little getting used if you aren't used to circle strafing (and Hover strafing takes even more getting used to) but once you have it down, you can apply the same principal to any cone attack in any set.

I use my Sands of Mu and Shadow Maul together as part of my regular attack chain (basically looks like I'm doing Sands of Mu 24/7). With AAO running it's amazing to behold a rain type of effect but with 30s replacing 3s. Drop a Soul Drain and it's off the hook

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I respec'd him a while ago adding the fighting pool for tough/weave. I have hasten and dropped haymaker which I miss.
So Im wondering. Can I drop hasten and put haymaker back in?
Do I need weave?
So basically of these 3- which two to have- haymaker, hasten or weave? Thanks in advance.

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Drop Punch (in favor of Boxing for Tough/Weave) and take Haymaker.

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Just a quick update. As of I15, the fix to cones hasn't really impacted this build at all. The biggest impact seems to be the range warping that leaping over the mobs created (being able to hit multiple mobs that were obviously outside the range of the cone). However circle strafing and hover strafing still produce the same results as before I15.

Let the good times roll!

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So you're still hitting more than 5 mobs on average with SM?

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I'm hitting the same amount I did before ... the only difference is I have to pay a little more attention to my positioning (which is what the fix ... fixed).

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You should know that in arc# 235308 (bosses) you should probably bring two strong Tankers (we did it last night fairly quickly with an L30 and an L50). Three Tanker isn't a bad run either as long as you're making up the DPS (and depending how many packs you like to take at once).

Just a quick update. As of I15, the fix to cones hasn't really impacted this build at all. The biggest impact seems to be the range warping that leaping over the mobs created (being able to hit multiple mobs that were obviously outside the range of the cone). However circle strafing and hover strafing still produce the same results as before I15.

Let the good times roll!

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I realize that the primary role of a tanker is agro control/taking dmg. I'm in the process of rolling a tanker (Inv/FM) and am wondering on solo-ability if needed and wether a solo tanker can put out enough dmg to (fairly quickly) defeat Elite Bosses. As an example, would my tanker, properly outfitted be able to solo the Tina McIntyre and Maria Jenkins arcs?

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Yes.

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I'm building a tank with shield defense as his primary but I'm stuck on choosing war mace or battle axe as the secondary. Is one better than the other or are they pretty even?

I'll go by popular opinion.

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I'd go War Mace ... it gives you slightly better AOE options (its cones are wider then Axe's). Otherwise the two are fairly close.

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Yeah, not seeing the snark either, Kruunch.

I'm a newer and more casual player. Until this weekend I'd been playing entirely outside of the AE. TBH the leveling pace has been quite snappy. Playing at most a few hours a night, with plenty of nights off, I'm at 41 after about 4 weeks. There aren't many MMO's where I could get 80% of the way to capped with that little play time.


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Actually most of them you can now. This isn't like the old days in EQ where it took 6 months to reach cap on a dedicated toon.

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I did do a few hours of AE last night just to see what the fuss was all about. Yeah, it's a bit extreme. A few hours later I'd gained 3 1/2 levels and with some badge turn-ins and auctions I earned something like 3-4x the influence I'd earned in my entire time up to level 37.

I can definitely see where that's a bit extreme and I don't think it takes being snarky to point that out. I'm guessing that 10 days is even pretty slow and that if someone wanted to push it they could hit cap in a few days of full time AE. The easy influence and all the recipes flowing in HAVE to have a dramatic effect on the economy.


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Yes, you can definitely cap well before 10 days ... I'd say roughly 10-12 hours played on a good team so whatever you schedule is that makes that up (1 day for the power gamer). Of course this isn't really new to CoH ... you could do the samething on the Portal Corp farms and bridge teams that have been around ever since they put PI into the game.

As far as extreme ... I guess that depends your perspective. I can max level a toon on creation in Guild Wars. Each game has their own levelling pace, and these levelling paces tend to change (get faster) as the game progresses. EQ and DAoC both cut their levelling requirements in half by the 5 year mark (where CoH is now) with DAoC offering bonus XP *weeks* on top of that.

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I think it's only fair that you do whatever is the most fun for you in the game, whether it's balanced or not.


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This is a slippery slope. "Balanced" is very subjective and ultimately you have to conclude that whatever the devs made available in their game is their idea of "balanced" for it (past obvious exploits such as the Meow farms).

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However I also think that it's pretty easy to see that AE's are pretty out-of-whack with the intended balance of the game AND the non-AE leveling rate is already pretty damn fast compared to the other games out there. Crying out that you're going to quit if they tweak it down a bit, well, let me just say I've been playing MMO's for about 15 years now and you're not exactly the first person to raise a such a hew and cry about balance tweaks, justified or not.

Anyway, just my (probably wasted) thoughts as a casual outsider who doesn't really have a lot invested in the game.

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I do agree that when compared to the normal mission brand of levelling, that the AE missions can seem out of whack ... then again that's what you get when you put the options of a mission in the player's hands. Alternatively, if you were to do full group normal missions on CL3 or higher, you'd pretty much achieve the same result (probably closer to 15 hours played but by and large pretty close).

As far as MMOs go, the first one was created in 1997 (Ultima Online) which puts the MMO market at 12 years (just an FYI). You could possibly include Meridian59 in that, but that was really more of a graphical MUD (the main difference being scope of world and server pop). I have been playing MMOs since UO (or Meridian59 if you include that in the MMO genre) and have seen many changes in the genre and in each game as its progressed ... levelling pace is a constant that becomes quicker over the life span of the game (I don't know of a single MMO that this hasn't held true for).

As for economy ... CoH's "economy" started out skewed and virtually non-existent. In its current form, since inflated influence is available from L1, the economy doesn't suffer nor do the players for it.

Finally your thoughts aren't wasted ... I actually appreciate the thoughtful perspective (as opposed to the silly whining of "farming is evil" nonsense that usually abides these discussions).

In the end its a matter of perspective. In other games I was on your side of the fence. In this one, because of the way the game plays, the current form the end game, and the fact that some of the biggest enjoyment is making the toon itself, I find that the quick levelling makes for more interest not less (for me of course).

Bingo.

Ice/WM is a good build. Solid mitigation from your secondary in stuns and knockdowns and good damage both ST and AOE.

Smells the Taunt debate horse rise like lazarus from the freshly dug grave .... again.

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I remember reading Castle saying, in effect, that the Reichsman fight was meant to be a "devices fight", or rather, a gimmick fight requiring choreography and coordination.

Which means, in effect, that apart from the costume and MA changes there is effectively no new content in i15. I got sick enough of failing and failing again against that sort of rubbish in other online games. Somebody is out of place. Someone does the wrong thing at the wrong time. The raid wipes: start over. There is much screaming and recrimination. Ventrilo or Teamspeak is required. The guild breaks up: this is "serious business". Lose 50 DKP!

This is a major reason why I no longer play those games. I seriously hope that this has been changed from the Test version.

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Lol ... then again there hasn't been new content since I1 by this premise

Heraclea, I understand what you mean having been a veteran of leading WoW raids, however I don't think you get quite the same effect out of an eight man group as you do from a 24 or 40 man raid.

Besides people will complain (like this thread) and the devs will nerf it down so a three year old epileptic sloth with ADD could do it .... like the rest of the "content" in the game.

Oh thank god you weren't replying to me

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I'm sure they aren't going to integrate a TF that isn't possible to defeat (regardless of what J_B says) with the current balance, however I must say I'm glad if they really are ratcheting the difficulty curve up... particularly before GR for the villains used to more difficulty.

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That would be a nice change of pace and it seems their (devs) end content is starting to go the WoW route with scripted end bosses, which I think is a step in the right direction. Makes the end fights memorable and unique.

I'm still bend over the way they nerfed the Terra Volta Trial .... had a great end encounter originally which they turned into Sesame Street.

Might involve splitting the group and alternating "teams" as well. Wonder if Castle just did Chromie in BWL (evil WoW reference)

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let me repeat - mag 100 stun...that is 1 with two 0's after it.

I dont know how many break frees you'd need to handle that, but doing it more than once seems unlikely.

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Yeah, even stacked CMs won't touch that.

I'd say Defense is the way to go. Maybe AoE and Smashing?

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Huh? Stacked CMs would work. That's the same MAG as Ghost Widow's Soul Storm, and people stack CMs for that just fine.

(I haven't had the chance to do the TF myself, but mechanically MAG100 is not insurmountable... whether that's what Castle desires or not. :P)

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If it's the same type of mechanic as GW's Soul Storm (swapping Stun for Hold of course), I've always beaten that in the past by combining Defense and toHit debuffs (my Fire/Dark Corruptor has solo'd GW).

If it's a toHit check, then that would seem like one option. Hopefully it's a little more involved then that.

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This idea seems to be a good way for me to get past the annoying tanking levels...

I may use this up until 22 and then go on to story arcs, so I can feel like a tanker.

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That's what I usually end up doing ... farming until my guy is into SOs and then taking him for a spin in the "real world" to see how the build holds up.

Then I PL him some more, rinse and repeat. I wouldn't trust my build advice based on an MA toon with regards to how it performs while levelling, since I'm not getting the full flavor of past levelling this way. My period stop and checks are just to see how they hold up at given points (usually every 5 levels or so).

I will say that Tanker's often get the wrong ideas when levelling this way, as I've seen a bunch of scranker builds. I wouldn't mind so much except when they inevitably try to step in and main tank (which is why I suggest the boss farms for trying out the toughness of your Tanker).

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let me repeat - mag 100 stun...that is 1 with two 0's after it.

I dont know how many break frees you'd need to handle that, but doing it more than once seems unlikely.

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Hmmm yeah even the T9s won't cover that gap.

Animation time? Does he say/do something before he lets loose that bad boy?

If it's an AOE I would think AOE Defense? Is it coupled with an attack or is that the effect by itself?

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He has a mag 100 stun that does-def and -res with a ton of damage and iirc it's aoe. 2 hits after that thing and it's team wipe central.

It seems to have lower accuracy though, I'm not sure which defense I'd need to slot for to help against it.

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100 mag stun? Wow.

Is there a casting animation for this stun? Might be a situation like Romi where you hide on the other side of the roof every time he rezzes?

The other solution of course would be to just pop a Break Free?

More info?

Score!

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Not sure if you were replying to me or not (don't think I've ever mentioned Ice/Ice) but ....

I don't know if I'd recommend EM right now ... it's sort of an annoying secondary currently (long animations). If you're determined to go Ice, Ice/SS is a strong combo (EA nullifying Rage and Hasten crashes nicely). Also Ice/WM and Ice/Axe are fairly good builds. Ice/Stone is also a good one although I'm not as high on Stone lately (lack of AOEs).

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How does ice/fire work? I'd assume it has fairly high damage ...much more than /ice at least..

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You would think but the problem isn't the damage, it's that */Fire has no mitigation at all, which the Ice primary could use. Fire/Ice works because Ice Patch works well with Burn, and also give Fire Armor the mitigation it needs.