Netphenix5

Doesn't an alt need to be a certain level to join a SG?

Given that (I assume) there STILL is no way to invite one's toons into one's SG, what would you do when you got an ex-villain turned hero and you're the last active player in your blue SG?

If you do use Ninja Run or Beast Run for travel, one word of advice - turn them off the instant you get into combat. They are endurance sinkholes and will make your blue bar plummet like few other things in the game. And short of getting incarnate Alpha Cardiac, there's no real way to change that. I'd strongly advise you not to rely on them for any kind of PVP, be it Arena or Zone.

One thing that people haven't mentionned (and that you may or may not have noticed) is that the former Fitness Pool is now inherent - ALL characters automatically get the powers at level 2. The inherent Swift and Hurdle, along with Ninja Run/Beast Run, made Super Jump borderline redundant, and turned Superspeed into a stealth power. And unlike those two powers, you can slot inherent Fitness to enhance its effects.

I could see a re-tweaked version of Trick Arrows as a "Natural/weapons" dom set. It already has an immob, a hold, an AoE hold, a patch knockdown, a blind... Man, it would take next to no effort to turn it into an actual control set.

Of course, it would beg an Assault version of Archery (with a melee "I poke you with my arrow !" attack? Oooh, and a PBAoE "I threw my quiver in the air and the arrows are raining on my head but only hitting my enemies"!) to settle the redraw issue.

Jeez, I need to stop hitting "save" so fast.

You gotta admit that it's frustrating though. On Vigilance, we play as if Keyes didn't exist, because the aggravation-to-fun ratio of that Trial is off the scale compared to the other two. It obviously needs some serious tweaks.

Short answer : yes, it is random. Sucks for your buddy, but it happens.

Long aswer : it still is random, but you can do some things to help them drop. Namely, the more mobs you off, the higher your chances. According to Paragon wiki, testing so far indicates that shards have abysmally low chances of droping on minions (I think 1 in a thousand or so), low on Lts (one in 250) and reasonable on bosses (1 in 50, give or take). So the more mobs in your mission, the more bosses you kill, the higher your chances. Each mob has a chance to drop a shard for everyone in the team, but the drop chances are calculated independently for each team member - so you could get 4 shards in 4 bosses while your team leder doesn't see one in the whole mission. Infuriating, I know, but that's how it works.

What doesn't shift your chances, AFAIK, is the con level of the mob. So long as it cons white or higher, it can drop shards, but an orange-con boss and a purple-con boss seem to give the same chances (AV and EB might have higher drop rates, but it's unconfirmed. Still, from my experience, they do). So the best way to "farm" threads is to set the mission so minions are at +0, and up the number of players you're worth. Setting the con level higher just makes it harder and longer to defeat the mobs, so in a way it hurts your drop rate.

The level shift from Alpha is screwy in this case. Technically it sets you up so your damage, HPs and such are that of a level 51 toon, but supposedly doesn't affect the rewards from mobs. Still, with it a +0 minion cons blue to you, and just to be on the safe side, I always set my missions to +1 when I look for shards. It supposedly has no other direct effect on shard drops.

As for the incarnate shifts, since they only activate in Trials, there's no way to change how they'd affect shard drops there even if you wanted to. And just for info, shards now drop on any level mission so long as the mob cons white to your exemplared level, so no need to do only TFs or even just level-50 stuff. I got 3 on a Caven of Transcendance Trial two weeks ago off level-15 mobs. And one of the best places I found to get shards in the Rikti Mothership Raid, since you're swimmingin high-con mobs (including swarms of EB Magi) just begging to be shot. I got 13 once on one Raid.

Hope that helps.

Actually some of the stuff you can find in the Midnighter's area implies that the Shadow Shard was created by them through a mystical artefact (Maria Jenkins confirms this in a roundabout way when she sends you against Black Swan) and that Rularuu itself is directly linked to the Dream Doctor, the founder of the club, and might even be the Dream Doctor himself. So Rularuu and his various aspects (and to a point their minions) could be said to be, not extradimensionals, but magical constructs from Primal Earth exiled to a pocket dimensional prison.

I heartily recommend this link. While YMMV and one may disagree with some of what's said in it (I know I do) it's still one of the most comprehensive ressources on Dominators we currently have.

Please please please Avatea, tell me that the "getting kicked from leagues over about 19" bug is getting looked into. It's getting INSANELY anoying, especially given that it used to work fine.

Okay, let me rephrase that : what element did you use to create those stacked floating stones?

Is it accessible from every server? I play on Vigilance.

Frankly, they could have made it look like a Grav Singularity. Bigger, different but still kinda similar, no?

Bon tant qu'à faire m'y suis mis aussi... Paris 14 pour l'instant.

Baring lurid thoughts and all, I'd tend to agree that Seers are very useful. Their psy damage is one of the least resisted in the game, they fly, and the buff from the support pet gives you extra damage, to hit and defense for 30s - and recharges in just that, so it's borderline perma.

I've also been looking at Clockworks for the Keyes Trial. The healing they give is HoT (healing over time) but ends up almost 50% stronger than the others from what I saw, which can be nice against the pulses. And their FF generator never goes out of style. Energy damage is often resisted in the game though.

If the Mind link buff from the fortunata recharged as fast though, I'd have been sorely tempted by the Arachnos. The toxic damage from the Tarentula is as rarely resisted as psy.

Carnies have a nice psy/dark/smashing mix and the buff boosts damage and accuracy for a whooping minute, but does nothing for mitigation beyond healing.

Polar Lights have a very nice amount of -DEF, but bring only some healing and assault to the table. I'd get as much +DAM with the seers.

Ghost might be tempting to some (who doesn't like Adrenaline Boost?) but look at its recharge : the toon will get to shoot it once, MAYBE two, in its whole 5 minutes of existence. No thanks.

I haven't been looking in as much details at the other pets, but I admit I skipped right over those with pure healing support (like the Cimerorans) or a mez resist (like the battle orbs - mez resist is why I have permadom in the first place)

How'd you manage the floating broken pavement look?

From the run we did last night, it appears that the obliteration beam is dodgeable in its first few seconds. The green circle appears on the ground, it starts buzzing, but the hold effect is delayed by a couple seconds - enough to combat jump out of it.

Has anyone been able to confirm if Loves a Challenge's requirements are limited to the final fight or not? Someone got Desintegrated in our run so we couldn't make sure even though we left the terminals alone.

A great way to farm shards is to do a Rikti Ship Raid and go for mob kills instead of bomb planting. Rikti Magi are EBs and as such likely have higher chances to give you shards, and the center of the ship is CRAWLING with them (at level 54 IIRC). Did one yesterday with a 18-strong league and I got 13 (!) shards in barely an hour. Go beat that.