Mesmer

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They Squishy hype is from the days before scaling defence.

Nowadays they are pretty resiliant - and are the best aggro grabbers in the game with chilling embrace. Once you have CE you cant play any other tank!

Funilly enough, the "String of bad luck will kill you" argument against defence actually matters the least to tanks - they have such high hit points it has to be a very very long string of bad luck to actually fell you. Im far more worried about defence / string of bad luck on my stalker for instance, where a couple of hard hits will knock them over instantly.

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It's fairly easy to get 2/3 shotted by say, Freak Tanks or Crey Tanks, if you get a run of bad luck.

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Or getting hit by every mob around you at the same time, while at the aggro cap. Doesn't matter than if you have 3000+ hitpoints then. Like I said, it doesn't happen very often, but it will happen on occasion.

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Im always a little weary on DEF based sets as you said a run of bad luck and you go down quick. Im pondering at present wether the fighting pool may be the way to go o alternatively the medicine pool.

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No powerpools are required for you to have a very survivable build. Strategic timing of the Self Heals and Energy Absorbtion, good use of the terrain and random inspiration drops are more than enough to make you virtually unkillable. There will be occasional moments where a streak of bad luck will kill you in a second(happened to me 3 or 4 times on my way to 50), but no power pools will prevent that from happening.

Also, a bit of knowledge on the mob types will help, as you need to know which mobs have advantages over your defenses(Nemesis with Vengeance, DE with quartzes etc..).

Good luck with IMO the most fun Tanker set in the game.

I'll bring my Tank, unless they're also doing a raid on Defiant at the same time again.

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i think ive hit a wall. A rather large wall with big spikey bits. my Scrapper is lvl 13. BS/Invul. And to be honest i struggle to find the motivation to play him. Please tell me when the fun starts because atm doing frostfire every time i get into a group is killing my will to be heroic >.<

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You don't HAVE TO get that character to 50. Just make something you do like and play that instead.

this is a joke right?

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What I've gotten so far is by stacking FF's dispersion bubble with hover, maneuvers, combat jumping and weave I can get better defense than a non-eluding SR scrapper.

Except that's kind of where I run out of ideas for what to do with it. Defenders aren't the AT I'm most familiar with either, so that definately doesn't help either. So basically, what would an SR-level defense defender be doing, besides not getting hit a whole awful lot?

Suggestions plx.

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Popping CaBs

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If you're not taking energy to maximize KB, or Psi/Rad to do damage, you're propably going to get bored with FF pretty fast...

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wow, I actually agree with MaX. Never thought it would happen

Good luck guys, I don't think I'll back from work to join in on this..... well maybe the Union raid

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Thanks for the help Mesmer, you gave some good ideias. Psionic Tornado is definetly out of my build hehe.

Although, when I get a respec, I'll get TP instead of SJ.

One more question: what is the MAG of Dominate?

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Mag 3

why didn't you just attack someone? That's usually a good way to get things going.

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I dont remember fights where force bubble wouldnt have protected you from me killing you a lot more. Also iirc during those cases I had something to coutneract the bubble, if nothing else than break frees.

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Trust me, if I just used FB for protection, like before I7 came out, it wouldn't be that difficult to kill me. The FB, PFF and Powerboosted Aid Self combo, makes me difficult to kill. FB alone is not even close to enough. Right now, I use FB to disrupt team coordination and movement, not really for protection.

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My Katana scrapper, for example, would not have stood the slightest chance of being able to hit you. Neither would my Human/Dwarf form Peacebringer (unless he used Light Form for the repel protection).

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That's the entire point of the power though. To give Melee protection.

People who think it's God Mode should roll a Bubbler themselves and see what it's like. It's not god mode at all. There are plenty of counters to it. Several sets have repel resistance(Invul, Stone, EA, MoG from regen, Lightform etc..), Kin defenders can give double ID for Repel Res, and very simply ranged attacks will completely negate it. Even the latency in PVP matches would give you something to take note off, as it would be possible to get a melee hit in if you were positioned wrong. You can even just hit the Bubbler with a Sleep power, as that will hit straight through his Mez protection.

I don't see why a pool power, Speedboost or even sprint should be able to counteract it. The only effect it gives is repel, that's all. No acc debuff like Hurricane. If everyone can just joust through the repel, then there is no point as it gives no protection then.

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Mes, I can tell you that force bubble is still extremely effective. Superspeed hasn't helped me much at all in fights against you or any other bubbler. One shot I can get thru once in a blue moon doesnt help me cause you still have disp.bubble to protect from disorient..

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And yet you've killed me on numerous occasions. It didn't seem to be that much of a problem then. Before I7, the power would give me enough protection for to survive with healthy supply of greens in my Insp tray. Now I need greens AND Powerboosted Aid Self to survive.

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I dont understand why a power must totally shut out an opponent for it to be 'effective'.

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This is the description of Force Bubble
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Creates a large bubble which protects all allies inside. While active, this power keeps all foes at bay, protecting all allies inside from melee or short ranged attacks. More powerful foes may be able to penetrate the Force Bubble, but may slip and get knocked down and forced back if they try

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So it should protect everyone inside from short ranged and melee attacks..... Except from "more powerful foes", meaning the people that have some form of repel resistance. Also note fact that these people may slip and get knocked down... that doesn't even happen as everyone with repel res, also has knockdown res and the knockdown of FB does not tick, or stack enough to hit through it.

So that is what the powers should do.

Currently, this is not what it does. I would change the description to this instead:
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Creates a large bubble which might protect all allies inside, if they're stupid enough to rely on it. While active, this power doesn't actually keep all foes at bay, because they will happily joust through it with uber powerful abilities like sprint and Superspeed, maybe even speedboost. More powerful foes may be able to penetrate the Force Bubble, but they don't really need to, because everyone else can do it as well

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Superspeed will also allow you to joust someone inside of Force Bubble - I speak from experience! I reckon thats a bug that needs fixing though - the ticks of repulsion are not fast enough to affect a superspeeder in time before they get into melee.

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Where were you when I posted this??. It's been broken for quite some time now. Even in PVE I've seen mobs pushing against the lower repel ticks quite effectively. It's ridiculous.

I'm guessing the number of actual people playing the FF set doesn't justify a fix any time soon.

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maybe, instead of them fixing the tick rate( I suspect this has to do with the "fix" to Hurricane which also affects FB ), they could increase the AoE range with another 10 - 15 yards or just enough to prevent any SS'ers to get into Melee range.

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. The only reason to get the power is to boost healing from aid self (medicine pool).

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and to get a ridiculous hight tohit buff from aim and build up.

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So Power Boost + Aim + Build Up = Instant Happiness?

In other words, does Power Boost increase the effectiveness of Aim & Build Up? Given that they both give a boost to accuracy and damage, does this mean that their damage buff is increased?

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Check the list of stuff MaX posted above. In the case of an Fire/EM build you only get the benefit from extra ToHit Buff(will easily have you hit through MoG and Personal Force Field) and extra healing, if you get Aid Self. If you go for example Ice/Em, you'd also get extra slowing ability and extra hold duration on your holds. So you could say that some builds benefit more from it than others, depending on the secondary effects they have.

For PVE, I'd say it's a skippable power. For PVP, I'd get it though.

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There are 2 powers in the FF set that are capable of this Repulsion Field and Force Bubble and having a lvl 50 Bots/FF MM i know 1 of these powers as i don't take repulsion field so that leaves force bubble it's not completley without flaws as there are powers that resist repel like unyielding from the invul set

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Repulsion field doesn't do repel, it does knockdown. The name is deceiving.

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/EA's hardcore, the amount of Mind/* Dom's and Controllers I've destroyed because they click TK and switch targets is disturbing. *dances inside someone's Repulsion Field*

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Repulsion Field does knockback NUB!!

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. The only reason to get the power is to boost healing from aid self (medicine pool).

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and to get a ridiculous hight tohit buff from aim and build up.

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Here's my build. I'm level 10 atm.

Name: Virtual Adept
Level: 50
Archetype: Defender
Primary: Force Field
Secondary: Psychic Blast
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01) --> Personal Force Field==> DefBuf(1) DefBuf(43) DefBuf(45)
01) --> Mental Blast==> Acc(1) Acc(3) Rechg(9) Dmg(15) Dmg(21) Dmg(34)
02) --> Subdue==> Acc(2) Acc(3) Rechg(9) Dmg(15) Dmg(21) Dmg(34)
04) --> Deflection Shield==> DefBuf(4) DefBuf(5) DefBuf(5)
06) --> Insulation Shield==> DefBuf(6) DefBuf(7) DefBuf(7)
08) --> Combat Jumping==> DefBuf(8)
10) --> Psionic Lance==> Acc(10) Acc(11) Rechg(11) Dmg(19) Dmg(33) Dmg(34)
12) --> Dispersion Bubble==> DefBuf(12) DefBuf(13) DefBuf(13) EndRdx(37) EndRdx(37) EndRdx(40)
14) --> Super Jump==> Jump(14) Jump(48) Jump(50)
16) --> Telekinetic Blast==> Acc(16) Acc(17) Rechg(17) Dmg(19) Dmg(33) Dmg(36)
18) --> Hurdle==> Jump(18)
20) --> Acrobatics==> EndRdx(20)
22) --> Health==> Heal(22) Heal(23) Heal(23)
24) --> Stamina==> EndMod(24) EndMod(25) EndMod(25)
26) --> Will Domination==> Acc(26) Acc(27) Rechg(27) Dmg(31) Dmg(33) Dmg(37)
28) --> Assault==> EndRdx(28) EndRdx(29) EndRdx(29)
30) --> Tactics==> EndRdx(30) EndRdx(31) EndRdx(31) TH_Buf(46) TH_Buf(46) TH_Buf(46)
32) --> Force Bubble==> EndRdx(32)
35) --> Vengeance==> DefBuf(35) DefBuf(36) DefBuf(36)
38) --> Psychic Wail==> Acc(38) Acc(39) Rechg(39) Dmg(39) Dmg(40) Dmg(40)
41) --> Dominate==> Acc(41) Acc(42) Rechg(42) Dmg(42) Dmg(43) Dmg(43)
44) --> Mind Over Body==> DmgRes(44) DmgRes(45) DmgRes(45)
47) --> Telekinesis==> EndRdx(47) EndRdx(48) EndRdx(48)
49) --> Repulsion Field==> EndRdx(49) EndRdx(50) EndRdx(50)

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Nicely planned out. I would only change some of the slotting, but not that much.
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10) --> Psionic Lance==> Acc(10) Acc(11) Rechg(11) Dmg(19) Dmg(33) Dmg(34)

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I'd change one of the accuracies here, to an interrupt reduction, or just remove one slot. This power is already highly accurate and you've even got Tactics to boost it more, so 2 acc's are not really needed.

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20) --> Acrobatics==> EndRdx(20)

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I'd try to get one more end reduc in here as you'll have this running during fights

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22) --> Health==> Heal(22) Heal(23) Heal(23)

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Health helps very little on low hitpoint AT's as it's regen rate is expressed in a percentage of your total hitpoints. The number of hitpoints you regen at a time won't be that much when you're taking damage, to the point where it won't help you at all. On a Tank though, it's much more helpful because they can get their hitpoints up to 3000+. So the will gain much more hitpoints back per tick. I'd suggest taking Swift here and using the slots on something else.

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32) --> Force Bubble==> EndRdx(32)

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I'd try to get one more end reduc in here, but it will depend on how much you plan on using this.

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38) --> Psychic Wail==> Acc(38) Acc(39) Rechg(39) Dmg(39) Dmg(40) Dmg(40)

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Another highly accurate power. One acc should be enough. You can exchange it for a recharge so you can use it more often. Nuking is fun afterall.

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41) --> Dominate==> Acc(41) Acc(42) Rechg(42) Dmg(42) Dmg(43) Dmg(43)

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No hold durations in this?? I guess it depends on how you plan to use it, but I'd defenitely slot this as a hold and not as an attack. If I had access to Dam/Mez Hami-O's I'd slot this as both though.

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44) --> Mind Over Body==> DmgRes(44) DmgRes(45) DmgRes(45)

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I'd try to get at least one, maybe 2 end reducs in here as you'll be using it during fights

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49) --> Repulsion Field==> EndRdx(49) EndRdx(50) EndRdx(50)

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I'd get Force Bolt here instead. It's more fun and much less of an end drain.

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There are less guides around for villains and players have had less time with them then heroes. Has anyone tried putting together a team of ultimate villains for PvP?

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I personally cant think of an ultimate team of villains that the EU test servers pvp'ers couldn't deal with. Infact I go as far as to say that the best team of villains would struggle against a semi decent team of heroes. But hey that's where the fun is, in the challenge right?

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Afaik You cant beat a villain team without Rad/psi's. They have too much resistance for anything else. Its cause people dont buff.
How many of you have ever had a team with 2 thermals, 2 colds, 2 kins and a sonic?

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Didnt have the sonic but had another thermal and a brute

P.S. Yes kicked [censored] but also know how I would deal with it.

P.S.S. Also in terms of balance I tend to look at in pentad way (1 of each AT in the team). Rightly or wrongly thats just how I look at it.

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yeah Pentad is broken for Villains, they lack in buffing ability in a pentad format. Where Heroes can field 2 buffers (trollers and defenders can both buff), villains can only field one( Corruptor ) as Masterminds are severely lacking in the buffing abilities(FF and Poison are the only ones that provide non static buffs )and the buffs they do have don't even come close to that Heroes have.

Villains are also too dependent on their inherent abilities to be effective. Blasters don't need Defiance to kill stuff, controllers don't need containment to be effective, but Brutes do need Fury to make any difference, Stalkers need hide to do any significant damage(except EM stalkers), Dominators need Domination to do anything etc..

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How many of you have ever had a team with 2 thermals, 2 colds, 2 kins and a sonic?

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That's not a villain team, that's a Corruptor team. Corruptors just happen to be Villain AT's . Corruptors are good, no doubt about that.

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The issue isn't controllers outdamaging blasters (although that does happen with fire/kin/fire), it's controllers at high levels outdamaging ATs with damage secondaries, in greater safety. Who does more damage, ice/emp/fire or emp/elec/power? Who's safer?

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Emp/Elec/Power by far. Power Build up + Thunderous Blast = dead mob. Takes about 5 seconds too. Same goes for Kin/*, Rad/Psi, basically anything with Sonic, Energy or Elec Blast. I agree that some combinations might be lacking(FF/Dark?), but then again, most troller combinations are lacking damage, so I don't see the problem. Again, look at powerset combinations and not AT's in general.

There are lots of powersets combinations that will outperform other powerset combinations from other AT's. That does not mean that one AT is overpowered compared to the other. By that reasoning Tanks need a nerf, because a Fire/Em Tank can easily outdamage most Scrappers with burst damage. Defenders would need a nerf as well, seeing that a Rad/Psi will destroy almost anything in a 1 on 1 PVP match.

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No. the epic Fireball isn't 0.55* Blaster fireball. If it were, there wouldn't be any need for this nerf. It's Fireball that has it damage scalar set (much) higher than normal Fireball, so that despite the 0.55 damage scale it does roughly equivalent amount of actual damage the Blaster fireball does. Factor in Containment, and it does twice the damage of Blaster Fireball.

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So what?? This does not mean that those blasts should be nerfed. Blasters can do +160% of their damage with aim and build up. More if you count Defiance. So using Powers available to them, Blasters can still greatly outdamage controllers, by a very wide margin, counting all the damage attacks they have. One blast or two blasts in an Epic set does not change this, but it does help Controllers solo better.

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Also Controllers don't get things like Aim and Build up, which is what really sets Blasters apart as the main damage dealer.

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Hey, if we start going down that road, Blasters don't get Fulcrum Shift either. But I'd really rather not bring /Kin into this.

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Please do, because I'm pretty sure not every troller gets Fulcrum Shift and /Kin is the real issue here. Fire/Kin is the nr 1 troller in the US and probably the most popular toon being leveled in the US at this moment.

Literally 70% of the toons running around PI will be Fire/Kin. The datamining the devs have done will show a heavily skewed result because of this. The controller AT is not outperforming, it's certain specialized combinations of powersets that are. Rather than fixing that, they just do a generally sweeping nerf on the Epic powers, that completely misses their intended target, but does manage to gimp other people in it's wake. I'm not a damage machine on my Mind/FF, or my Grav/Rad. I don't consider being able to kill an even level minion at lv 50 with one attack chain to be overpowered.

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They will still give "a bit more damage", it's not like it's all taken away.. Fireball with Containment will still equal Blaster Fireball in damage.

Blaster epics don't turn them into tankers or controllers either, although they include control powers and shields.

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I don't see why Controllers can't have a lv 2 Blaster power when Blasters get lv 2 controller powers and Tier 9 Tanker powers. I can still kill a boss faster than any troller on my blaster and I can clear an 8 man spawn faster than any Fire/Kin on my blaster.

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Nobody is taking away the Fireball. The control powers in Blaster epics are on Blaster mez scale, not controller mez scale. Your argument would work if blasters got a ST hold that had the same duration as controller holds, doubled if they shot at the target first with a tier 1 blast.

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Controllers ranged damage modifier is already lower than that of a Blaster, same way a Blaster gets lower duration from hold compared to a troller, so an extra reduction to that damage was not needed. The blasts also have a higher end drain( which is waaay too high now, considering the damage done )compared to the Blaster version, which is already significant.

Also Controllers don't get things like Aim and Build up, which is what really sets Blasters apart as the main damage dealer.

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And Defiance helping to deal potentially 300% (was it? max value..) buffed damage?

Chiefette

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500%, full Defiance should get you to the damage cap. Controller's cap is 400% I think, but with containment they get double that, which is what the real problem is here.

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But only if they have fulcrum shift, and fulcrum shift as a power breaks the ED/Post-I5 paradigm more than any other power in the game.

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On Fire/Kin controllers with Epic AoE blasts, yeah it does. On anything else, not really

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They will still give "a bit more damage", it's not like it's all taken away.. Fireball with Containment will still equal Blaster Fireball in damage.

Blaster epics don't turn them into tankers or controllers either, although they include control powers and shields.

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I don't see why Controllers can't have a lv 2 Blaster power when Blasters get lv 2 controller powers and Tier 9 Tanker powers. I can still kill a boss faster than any troller on my blaster and I can clear an 8 man spawn faster than any Fire/Kin on my blaster.

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Nobody is taking away the Fireball. The control powers in Blaster epics are on Blaster mez scale, not controller mez scale. Your argument would work if blasters got a ST hold that had the same duration as controller holds, doubled if they shot at the target first with a tier 1 blast.

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Controllers ranged damage modifier is already lower than that of a Blaster, same way a Blaster gets lower duration from hold compared to a troller, so an extra reduction to that damage was not needed. The blasts also have a higher end drain( which is waaay too high now, considering the damage done )compared to the Blaster version, which is already significant.

Also Controllers don't get things like Aim and Build up, which is what really sets Blasters apart as the main damage dealer.

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And Defiance helping to deal potentially 300% (was it? max value..) buffed damage?

Chiefette

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500%, full Defiance should get you to the damage cap. Controller's cap is 400% I think, but with containment they get double that, which is what the real problem is here.

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They will still give "a bit more damage", it's not like it's all taken away.. Fireball with Containment will still equal Blaster Fireball in damage.

Blaster epics don't turn them into tankers or controllers either, although they include control powers and shields.

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I don't see why Controllers can't have a lv 2 Blaster power when Blasters get lv 2 controller powers and Tier 9 Tanker powers. I can still kill a boss faster than any troller on my blaster and I can clear an 8 man spawn faster than any Fire/Kin on my blaster.

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Nobody is taking away the Fireball. The control powers in Blaster epics are on Blaster mez scale, not controller mez scale. Your argument would work if blasters got a ST hold that had the same duration as controller holds, doubled if they shot at the target first with a tier 1 blast.

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Controllers ranged damage modifier is already lower than that of a Blaster, same way a Blaster gets lower duration from hold compared to a troller, so an extra reduction to that damage was not needed. The blasts also have a higher end drain( which is waaay too high now, considering the damage done )compared to the Blaster version, which is already significant.

Also Controllers don't get things like Aim and Build up, which is what really sets Blasters apart as the main damage dealer.

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that would nerf Kin defenders though, not just controllers.

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Yes, and corruptors. Your point?

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aww, you're right those guys require a good hard nerfing.

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They will still give "a bit more damage", it's not like it's all taken away.. Fireball with Containment will still equal Blaster Fireball in damage.

Blaster epics don't turn them into tankers or controllers either, although they include control powers and shields.

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I don't see why Controllers can't have a lv 2 Blaster power when Blasters get lv 2 controller powers and Tier 9 Tanker powers. I can still kill a boss faster than any troller on my blaster and I can clear an 8 man spawn faster than any Fire/Kin on my blaster.