McNum

Just a fair warning, they've weaponized the power of friendship. Literally. You probably don't want to mess with them. There are easier sources of BBQ meat around.

I do remember you, though. The Eye of Sauron is hard to forget, and I distinctly remember thinking to myself "Well, the post matches the name alright...", so take that as you will.

Also, Firefox spellchecker, I am disappointed... "Sauron" is not in the dictionary.

For Dual Blades, too, of course. Dualwielded chainsaws!

An electric guitar for Battleaxe and an acoustic guitar for Mace. Kabong!

I thought they were iSentinels.

But then why would they be on the X-Men's side?

There's something to be said about having customers who voluntarily gives up what you could do to get more money from them, isn't there? And not even in a "We want this!" way, but in a "Well, if you wanted to sell the same thing to me over and over, I'd probably fall for..." way.

I figure it'd work as the Signature Summon does. You claim it, and you get a dialog box where you choose what character this is supposed to summon. Pick and you get a temporary power doing just that.

There are some bad edge cases, though. Like what happens if you pick a character and then delete it before you use the summoning power? I'd have the power just fail if that was to happen, but it's one of those things that could be bad.

Overall, though, this is the power I'd buy most often, I think. Sure, teaming up with the Phalanx is cool and all, but teaming up with my own character? So awesome!

I'd keep a couple of these powers handy at all times, too. My Bubbler would love my Blaster along and and the same goes the other way around. And everyone loves a Trick Archer.

But yeah, this will be a server resource drain as it has to access the character database and pull out a Doppelganger version of a stored character. Which is why it's a good idea for a repeatable purchase. You might be a drain when you summon it, but you're paying up front to do it. It'd be funny if everyone summoned an alt during a Mothership Raid, though.

Now there's a fun counter-spam. Outbid them with free inf.

Gotta need deep pockets to pull it off, but it'd be hilarious.

Personally, I'm paranoid with my CC info online because I KNOW people are out to get it. (Hmm, is it paranoia if people ARE out to get you?) I'd never, ever, hand over my card info to anyone on an unsecured connection and even then I know that the "secure" databases get cracked occasionally, but in those cases, my bank has me covered.

PL service is also really dumb as you'll be handing over your game password. Most people have a common password, and if you hand over yours to the crooks, they'll try it everywhere they might think you could be a customer. Which is why having a common password is a bad idea. If the crooks get you, they get ONE, and only one.

And yeah, I use the word crooks, because that's what they are. It's not about violating the spirit of the game, it's about not funding the mafia or whoever is sitting on the good end of these kinds of scams. Let's not make it easier for them than it has to be.

Mostly confirmed. A higher accuracy measurement still sees the neutrinos as faster than light, and for the time being, it's the best explanation, but it still needs an outside confirmation.

Still, superluminal neutrinos? The possibility is looking better and better.

She does strike me as the kind of Hero that's just a Vigilante Morality Mission away from taking a walk on the redder side. And this arc? Well there's her motivation, isn't it?

If Statesman doesn't get there first, of course. A good reason for the player villain NOT to do it, is that whoever does might end up with a concave face with a red star spangled fist in it.

Nah, but a power like Hover does make it easier to aim, allowing for a bit more finesse.

Not entirely, but using Hover, you can angle your shots to change the distance and direction of the knocked back target. With a little practice, you can deliver the target exactly where you want it to be, and if you just want to pummel a boss into the ground to keep it from standing, just hover directly above it and spam your knockback. It'll get spiked into the ground.

It's the difference between learning how to use knockback right and being indirectly forced to turn it off. I prefer the former, because proper knockback is fun. It's also fun to use Hover to angle yourself below an enemy on a rooftop and knock them in a high arc off the building. It's raining snipers!

Yes, because Explosive Blast would knock back some of the enemies, causing the retaliation to be staggered and delayed, allowing the teammates to get their attacks off before the enemies get a chance to fire back.

Thus, tossing in Explosive Blast as an opener, while still not a good idea, is still a better option than Fireball. I'd suggest Energy Torrent, though. Easier to aim, and more reliable knockback. Or Power Burst on a Boss, but you need to get closer to do that, and by that time, the rest of the team should already have taken a shot.

I also expected that reply.
For all the Melee types, I'd pick their status protection. Not because it annoys me, but if they want to take my Force Bolt away, they lose their most precious power, too. Force Bolt is what keeps me alive when a rogue enemy decides that it'd much rather beat up the Forcefield Defender than the Brute. They get a trip back to Brute-land for that effort. I don't need to kill the enemy doing that, I just have to make sure that it lands somewhere unsafe. You know, actual aimed knockback. I'm not the type to rush into a spawn and knock them all who knows where, even if the secondary is Energy. I try to aim for the enemy between me and the Tanker, if we have one.

This is not being fair, mind you, it's about me being as big a nuisance to them as they are to me. One might also call it "making a point", although that comes second. I'm just getting sick and tired of knockback being the Devil, when frankly, it's not. It's also not the tool for every problem, of course, but it's handy to have, and I miss it when I play a character who doesn't have any knockback. If I could have one power on all my characters, it'd be Force Bolt. No, the Nemesis Staff doesn't count, it recharges too slow.

If I were to actually be reasonable, there are a few powers there that I could see not wanting. Like for the coming TPN trial, any uncontolled pets, like the Illusions and Plants pets should really stay in the power tray for some parts. Since destroying cameras and scaring civilians can cause the trial to fail. But the same goes for any lasting AoEs, really. No Rain of Fire, no Sleet, no Blizzard, no PBAoE attacks unless you REALLY check your targets first, and so on. Carrion Creepers are right out. But that's mission specific, and there aren't really that many missions where "blasting everything with AoEs" isn't the best solution. There are also very few missions where you want Force Bubble or Detention Field, but in those few there are, it's one of the best tools in the game. Like a Force Bubble to block the exploding zombies in the Sutter TF, or using Detention Field to lock away the Abomination in the Halloween trial when hunting zombies, or caging a tower in the STF, to make life easier for the Taker holding Recluse's attention while we take out another tower. Very situational, mind you.

This is also part of a problem for knockback and CoH. It's a little of a relic from the original design where we'd fight three minions. With fewer targets, knockback is much more useful, after all. Which is why it annoys me that AVs are just so immune to knockback. I've tried doing the math on getting Force Bolt up to silly magnitude to actually beat that, but I can't make it work, sadly. I would SO overslot Force Bolt for knockback if I could get it to AV knock level. I would make an IO build with the sole intention of beating the knockback resistance on just one single AV. Just to show it'd be possible. But I don't think it is...

I do know how it is to want to get rid of some part of the game, as I was one of those guys when it came to Sonic Resonance back when it had the headsplitting animation. But medical reasons is a fair excuse in my book. DPS and scatter? Not so much.

I've been thinking of making a Storm/Energy Defender, just to show how it's done properly, but I'm thinking Storm/Ice now. Better theme. An Ice/Storm Controller is just sidestepping the point as you can lock the enemies down and prevent knockback with that.

When the Blaster first tosses a Fireball at an 8 man +3 spawn before anyone else gets aggro. That would be an improper use of Fireball. Especially if the enemies retaliate with AoEs and you're standing in the middle of the team.

If anything is to change with knockback, it should be making all the chance for knockback guaranteed. Knockback is one of the most powerful positioning tools in the game, when you can rely on it. I would not hesitate to call Force Bolt one of the most powerful powers in the game, and all it does is hit an enemy to move them where you're aiming.

It's how the world reacts to knockback that's the problem. Where are the environmental hazards? We've got lava, and in lava maps, knockback reigns supreme. But why not have electrified walls, spikes, acid vats (that the Skull chemical vats are covered is such a tease), bottomless pits and so on? Further, in situations where knockback would be awesome, like single tough targets, the target is usually completely immune to knocks. I get why Statesman is, he's an Invul Tanker, but I don't see why I can't knock Ghost Widow or Manticore around. They don't have any KB resist powers, except for the AV status.

I'd love if one of the next incarnate trials had parts where low damage knockback would be perfect. Like moving civilians out of the way, or tossing high resist enemies away from something they need to stay close to.

Now if you wanted to add an effect to ragdolling, you could strip the enemy of any resistance and defense buffs above the base of what their rank allows. Can't very well dodge when you're ragdolling around, can you?

Of course, I'm wholly opposed to having ANY kind of "disable knockback" option in the game. For reasons this thread easily demonstrates. If I have to turn off my knockback, I get to pick a power YOU can't use while you're teamed with me. Deal? Thought not.

And suddenly, I know how Wedge feels. Stupid Luke kid getting himself in trouble all the time. At least he wasn't mission critical in the Hoth trial.

I'd like for the taking down Cole to be twofold, actually. I do want to big showdown at Tyrant's Tower, preferably on that big shiny gold star right in the middle of the plaza. I also want this to be a right slobberknocker, with few gimmicks, just a powerful single foe that we have to beat the Well out of. Give him a big battle aura so he's easy to spot in the crowd, though.

But for Cole's final fate, I'd love a single player mission. It'd be pretty much a lore mission, as we'd already done the big fight, but I would like at least an opportunity to hear his motive rant. Without having to stall the league every single time he does it. Basically a mission where you deal with Cole in the way you prefer and... unlock the next set of Incarnate slots. Remember, Cole has the power to do that, and it'd be a good way to end the Praetorian arc.

Although, my favorite idea for the Tyrant's Tower trial would have the fight rudely interrupted by Praetorian Hamidon. Because all those huge buildings and a big open plaza? That's a perfect spot to fight a gigantic tentacled monstrosity. That an the only thing that could possibly smack Tyrant across the face with a clue-by-four is the appearance of Praetorian Hamidon IN Nova Praetoria. He's a Tyrant, but there's no way he'd let Hami get away with that. Yeah, the teaming up with the villain to take on something larger has been done, but if we want Praetoria to end up useful for the further story, we need Hamidon out of the picture, and Tyrant either redeeming himself through sacrifice, or otherwise defeated. I'd like to keep him around, though. I like his brand of villainy, the whole doing evil for a perceived good reason (and Hamidon is a pretty good reason) it'd be shame to waste it.