New_Dark_Age
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Posts
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Joined
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Quote:Sure it will. Unfortunately the old animation and the days of EM being the undisputed single target king are over. I think it is more probable that that devs will give EM more AOE damage/mitigation than simply restoring ET to its former glory. Even if its single target dominace was restored EM will still suck on teams.Originally Posted by Cyber_naut
Considering it's a bottom feeder in terms of aoe damage and mitigation, and it's best attack damages the user, it should be heads and shoulders above other sets in terms of single target damage (because that is literally all it's got), not on par with others that have better damage mitigation and aoe abilities.
You compare em to dm, so lets look at them then. Pretty close in terms of single target damage, but after that, em gets wrecked. Again, em's best attack damages the user every time its used, and thanks to it's ridicu-long animation, on teams, you will constantly be et'ing corpses while still damaging yourself -not a lot of fun. DM's best attack (arguably), heals the user, adding a great deal of damage mitigation and survivability.
Neither set is very strong in terms of aoe, but dm certainly has more options, with shadow maul early on, an aoe end drain power that does minor aoe damage, and a build up power that does minor aoe damage (edit:holy crap i just looked up the damage on mids - it does the same damage as whirling hands? LOL... wow.) but also grants a nice to hit buff.
And finally, anyone who has played both sets extensively, and is not suffering from massive drug abuse, will choose dm over em for almost every single situation, because it's simply a much better set than em in almost every situation - and most importantly, it's a lot more fun to play than the sluggish and frustrating em, post nerf.
Again, I'm not claiming the set is completely unplayable, but it needs some buffs to compete with most other powersets. A slight tweak to wh is not going to do it.
Giving Whirling Hands a larger radius with a high chance to stun would make EM equal to Super Strength. Super Strength really has one AOE but it is a Good AOE. It also has one single extreme damage attack and Rage. If the change to WH occurs, EM will have one good AOE, 2 Extreme Damage Attacks and Build Up. That makes it more ideal to me than SS because of its less resisted damage.
Once again the animation changes are overexaggerated. Hitting something with ET feels no different than hitting something with KO Blow. You think if I could have 2 KO blows in my set I would complain about animation times ? I am grateful EM has 2 extreme target attacks but its AOE sucks and giving it more AOE is more benefical to the game overall rather than just making it a single target king again. -
Quote:Ok ? ? ? That is not really related to my question. Invinc has no appearance right now so I am asking why.Originally Posted by Roderick
Invulnerability is one of the armor sets that got a No FX option. It also has Bright (original Hero mode) and Dark (original villain mode) options.
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No one seems to be responing to my other thread so I am hoping someone can help me here. I intended to reroll my Fire/Fire Scrap into a Fire/Invul since FA is too weak but I noticed Invinc no longer has a visual effect. I then entered the game and asked a high lvl invul to turn on his invinc and no visual effect remained on him. One person in the game told me it is a bug. Is this true ? Any word when this will be fixed ?
Thanks -
Can someone tell me why Invincibility does not have a visual appearance anymore? Is it a bug ? Is it trying to be as boring as Will Power ?
If this was done intentionally by the devs then it should be changed back. The Aura is suppose to be bright for a reason. If players dont want one then I believe they have the option to turn the effects off and they can just role a visually boring Will Power.
So what is going on ? Whatever it is Invincibility should have its awesome visual effect back. Taking it away from players at this late stage in the game would be a load of crap and unprofessional. -
Quote:Good players do not die to often so the stance of all the people supporting these Tier 9th Rezzes falls flat on its ***. It simply shouldnt be used that much if the rest of the set is doing what it is suppose to be doing. If good players find themselves using ST/ROTP often then there are inadequacies of the set in question.Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
No matter what you do, you WILL die. Having a power to use then is a benefit, not a loss, and if you can't see the logic behind that, then go to hell.
Having a rez like Soul Transfer would be benefical....IF THE POWER WAS FREE. It isnt free so there are more logical powers to take. The only benefit ST and ROTP could have to a Brute/Scrap/Tank is that the power can be skipped. Any improvements to these rez powers as someone was advocating would be meaningless and a waste of time.
Furthermore the mere existence of such powers in Dark Armor and Fire Aura could only hinder the Devs from repairing their deficiencies. If they made FA and DA as strong and surviviable as WP, Invul, Shields, then there would very very little use for such rez powers making them virtually useless. The Philosophy behind them is asinine and it is especially asinine for Tankers. Every other set on the game has a Tier 9th that improves surviviablity , except DA and FA. I am certain that if Strength of Will did not exist and in its place was a Rez these same people would here defending Tier 9th Rezzes , completely ignoring the fact that there is a better way. If there is to be a Rez power in a set, it shouldnt be a Tier 9th.
FA and DA are two of the weakest secondaries. FA has pathetic mitigation and lacks the damage it promises and DA is just a series of high end cost mediocre powers which do nothing special. Either the entire set should be buffed making the Tier 9th rez worthless or the Tier 9th should be something powerful to improve surviviablity as it is in all other sets. -
Quote:Originally Posted by Leo_G
Well, WP has nothing to complain about considering it get a mini-tier 9 + a rez earlier on. And that's not even mentioning the +dmg, +ToHit, +recovery and +rech bonus attached to that self rez.
In all honestly, it's probably one of the *better* self rezzes because you can just pop that god-mode afterwards.
As for Soul Transfer, it's not *that* bad. Yes it stuns....a mag *30* stun! What can resist that barring a GM? But I wouldn't be opposed to adding a self buff to it like a +def per foe for 60sec afterwards...or perhaps an unresistable debuff to dmg and ToHit on the foe?
All Tier 9th self-rezzes are garbage and should be replaced. Any power that requires the player to die can always be replaced by something more useful. There is no logic in defending powers such as Rise of the Phoenix and Soul Transfer, especially now will all the sets we have. Anyone who advocates ST and ROTP remaining in FA and DA is a fool who is pissing on the wheels of progress.
Dark Armor needs a few more improvements other than this but whatever; I will approve. Fire Aura also needs much attention as well. -
Quote:Originally Posted by Cathodian
To put it quite plainly, I don't think any Melee set should get more AoEs.
Why ? How is Energy Melee's AOE not subpar ? -
Quote:Dont forget observation as well. How dare I or he form an opinion about the strength of such builds simply by observing them in action and logically assessing the effectiveness of mulitple pets and debuffs against all situations of the game supported by general knowledge of the game's powers, archetypes and NPC capabilities !!!!Originally Posted by MunkiLord
I agree, there is no way he should possibly come to any kind of conclusion like that based on all the wonderful things said about those builds. Especially if he admits that he isn't sure if he's right and welcomes others opinions. How dare he!!
I guess I also cannot assess the effectiveness of builds having fought them many times before the PvP changes. I must play one to 50 to form a valid opinion !!!
Seriousness : God Fulmens must suck at assessing things. -
Quote:And its chance to stun increased please so it can disable mobs for a couple of seconds as a knockback AOE would. Decrease the stun duration accordingly.Originally Posted by Starsman
Actually, I noted that the biggest nerf to the set was the Energy Punch nerf that almost no one noticed. When it comes up to DPS, the power was extremely fast and low recharge meaning it was critical to generating DPS. Don't take me wrong, the ET nerf hurt, but only few high recharge builds got to truthfully feel the hurt of that nerf.
The barrage change did almost nothing as my calculator still skipped Barrage due to low DPAS.
I also don't think the Energy Punch nerf was intentional, just part of the animation rooting standardization that came with the revision of all animations for the creation of Shields.
I do think the ST DPS of EM is a bit too low for the low amount of AoE damage it possesses. It's hard to get an improvement in ST DPS, though so I would go the other way and just note that Whirling is doing less damage than the AoE formula denotes it should do, therefore it should either have it's radius or damage increased. -
I will make this brief since I am very tired.
I intend to try both and I want to know how do they solo. On paper they look quite strong . How do Forts and Crabs solo against mobs and bosses? Are they just minion melters or can they make short work of a boss?
I once played a Spine/Regen scrapper to lvl 41 and I fount his single target damage too low and fights against bosses took too long. I do not want to deal with that again so please tell me when fighting bosses solo if the Fort and Crab will do better. Already know both ATs have the AOE covered , especially the Crab.
This will be my first time on a VEAT. Thanks -
Quote:Yeah I find most of the complaints a bit overexaggerated. For a Tanker , I could not see how the downgrade would weaken the set that much. In single target damage it is still solid and I certainly do not get frustrated when my target dies before TF or ET strikes because most of the time I knew that there was a high chance they would anyway. If I miss or they die before the attack lands, oh well, there is always the next engagement. As for the animations being insensitive to recharge, I already find EM attacks to recharge fairly fast so I dont have as much use for greater recharge in my secondary.Originally Posted by Grey Pilgrim
Okay, can someone remind me what the changes to EM were?
I believe they were dropping TF's stun from Mag 4 to Mag 3, changing/lengthening ET's animation, and upping Barrage's damage while also increasing its endurance use and recharge. Am I missing something?
If not, it seems really odd to me that increasing ET's animation by 1.67 seconds nerfed the set THAT badly. Yes, that's now 2.67 seconds, which certainly does feel longer than one second. At the same time, it does a big chunk of damage more than Greater Fire Sword, which animates only .33 seconds faster (mildly noticeable, but not that much). And I don't hear people whining about GFS much.
Was Energy Melee that much in the lead before? It doesn't seem like 1.67 seconds on one power is enough to drop it down and make it as bad as some people are saying. Or are we now looking evaluating the performance of powers in a different way than before the changes to EM (and how much do changes to other powersets account for this? I'm thinking the dropping of "redraw time" from the weapon powersets, etc.)?
I'm also curious about this. How much of the disgruntlement with Energy Melee is purely by the numbers after the nerf, and how much is it with aesthetic? I hear a lot of grumbling about the animation look of ET and how the set is slower now, so I'm trying to separate the emotion from the reality.
I don't have quite as much issue with EM that some here seem to, so I also wonder if it's partially a difference in expectation. I have plenty of experience with longer animating attacks from Fiery Aura (the AOEs and GFS are all between 2-3 seconds), Shadow Maul, Full Auto, etc. So I'm comfortable with longer animations and knowing when to fire them (I generally don't have targets drop before the attack I selected goes off).
Anyway, just some honest questions to dig down into the issue.
I do feel that the AOE should be buffed. EM is no longer the undisputed ST damage king so there is no justiication for the lack of AOE. -
Quote:Seriously, if I could you wouldnt see my character at all with his toggles on. The Aura would be so ridiculously huge, like a 1000 foot radius, where all you see me as is a distant shape in the center.Originally Posted by Dispari
Pfft, are you saying my characters don't look good? Cause I'd rather see them than a bright white/red/orange/purple/green glow.
Now that is a character. Not some subtle chump like a WP.
S***ton of energy = cool
F***ton of energy = very cool -
Quote:Well then they should not have had the so called natural set be so effective and unique unless they made a prominent set with the same powers. Then maybe it wouldnt be annoying. :/Originally Posted by Dispari
It's not that they "didn't put work into its appearance," the minimal graphics is intentional because it's a "natural" set that uses the character's willpower and not supernatural powers. In fact it was also because all other sets have that huge visual appearance that they wanted something to give natural characters who didn't want to glow like the sun.
Two of my WP toons even run with with NoFX these days.
You may destroy well on a Will Power, but you won't look good doing it. -
Quote:Will Power looks like crap. It is too subtle. I want characters who have Energy, Fire, Ice, or some badass powerful prominent glow to them that makes them look formidable. Will Power has none of this. It is boring and quite frustrating because I would have made a WP long ago if the effects when you first activate the toggles remained on the character or the effects were similar to Invul. I wish the devs would have put more work into its appearance.Originally Posted by JanusFrs
Ive been playing CoH 4 some time now, b4 I11 respectively, and i dont undrstand, why is it that so many ppl "hate" WP? I myself think it's a nice set, as it delivers the usual res, possibly a lil weak without SoW, a mezz prot, a def, a def nuke, a taunting aura (which is in my opinion cool as it is very unique), and then it has some special cookies (reg, rec, rez!)...
The thing i dont get is why other ppl dont like it... What things about this powerful will is it that im skipping?
So WP is powerful, but all characters I see playing it look like crap when compared to my characters. There is no point playing a character that looks like crap. -
Quote:Yeah EM currently has no way to stop mobs from attacking like SS. Stone, Ice and Elec. I do think the chance to stun in WH should be increased and its stun duration decreased so it can stop mobs temporarily. Its radius should be increased as well.Originally Posted by all_hell
Or perhaps the stun duration could be decreased.
It doesn't need to stack, just to cut the aggro for a second or two at a time. kind of like knockdown.
If no other changes will occur, then WH should be buffed. -
I think the very least that can be done is to improve Whirling Hands. Its chance of stun and current radius should be improved. Other Tanker AOES like Footstomp , Ice Patch, Thunderstrike and Lightningrod are more benefical because they mitigate damage by knocking the mobs on their *** for a couple of seconds. The current Whirling Hands only has I believe a 30 percent chance of a stun and a weak 8ft radius.
If the radius as improved to 15ft and chance of a short stun to 70 percent I think it would be a great help. Such a change would also be much more simple.
As for Billz Idea, if ET was a PBAOE I think TF should have to be buffed slightly in some regard to compensate. I still like the idea though. -
Quote:Originally Posted by magikwand
I am of the belief that a tanker is made by his primary and not so much by his secondary. You seem to constantly tie in the performance of the secondary as indicative of the performance of the primary. I don't agree.Tanking ability in, many circumstances, has little to nothing to do with your secondary. On that note, Energy melee is a secondary for tankers and NOT a primary. Please understand that.
Sure, adding more dmg to Whirling Hands would be nice, but I don't see the correlation between you being relegated to a secondary tanker and this single underwhelming power. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that the power is fantastic, but I don't see how you are tying the two together.
If you are all that concerned about damage- be it AoE or ST, you probably should have just rolled a scrapper to start. So yes, I will nitpick on your point there- if you want a damage heavy AT, why would you start with one that you know will be extremely hard pressed to achieve on the high end what a poorly built scrapper can achieve on his worst day? It is pretty much a fact that it is considerably more effective and easy to make a scrapper achieve survivability that is close to a tank than making a tank achieve scrapper levels of damage.
And you seem to contradict yourself, you are saying you want EM's aoe dmg potential increased, and you seem to be jilted by the fact that scrappers do more damage than tanks, but then you say that the damage should not have more damage than scrappers. What do you want?
WP tankers have a little more trouble maintaining aggro sometimes, and that is probably the only secondary I would see having issues with a secondary like EM. If your primary is Ice Armor and you have problems maintaining aggro- you are doing something wrong. I will say it again- if you are an Ice Armor tank and have issues with aggro, you are doing something wrong. I believe Ice armor is the most aggro ******* set available to tanks. I would also not throw Invulnerability in the same pot as Willpower for aggro management. Invuln is far ahead of willpower in the taunt department.
One more point. As far as "nerfs" go- there is never a promise of receiving anything in return of a powerset being nerfed. I don't know why you would expect it to be so.
Most tanker secondaries have better or equal AOEs to Scrapper primaries. Does this mean Tankers have more damage ? No it doesn't. The AOEs are important to Tankers for arggo control more than damage. Regardless, they wont hit as hard as a Scrapper and they shouldnt. -
I have pondered this question ever since taking my level 42 Ice/EM tanker out of hiatus. The most recent opinions regarding Energy Melee have been negative. I have seen numberous post recently either advising that a player not take Energy Melee or claiming that the downgrade has greatly weakened the set. When I looked at the overall perspective , I could not see how simply doubling Energy's Transfer activation time and decreasing the stun in TF would severely weakend the set, except in the case of Brutes who benefit more from fast attacks. While EM has no doubt been weakened, I still find it powerful against single targets. I am a heavy hitter man who loves powers like KO blow , ET, TF, Seisimic smash so while slower I still find EM quite satisfying. Unfortunately, I find myself weaker in teams.
My Tank is quite durable but I am continueously outshown by all other sets because of their greater AOE attacks. I jump into a crowd and hit Whirling Hands then they jump into a crowd and hit Foot Stomp, Lightning Rod/Thunder Strike , Tremor, Combustion/Fire SWORD Circle and make me look like a chump. I then quickly become the secondary tanker/scranker for the team. I just cant contribute enough AOE when compared to others. I do have Taunt toggles but often the mob is dead so quickly that I might a well leave them off. This would be even worse for some other sets like WP and Invul.
Energy Melee lost some of its strength with the recent downgrade but it received nothing in return. Its very low AOE damage was not increased in any way. I understand that Whirling Hands is a Tier 5 Power and therefore probably should not match a Tier 9th like Foot Stomp or Lightning Rod. Nevertheless the developers should ponder this question as well.
There is another factor; Scrappers getting Energy Melee. If they do and Energy Melee is not changed at all, then why would anyone roll a EM tanker ? Playing a Scrapper would play more to EM's strengths so there is no logical reason to make an EM Tanker other than having that prestigous Tanker symbol by your name. While some may nitpick me on reasons to roll a Tanker, it is not the point. As far as effectiveness goes , there would be no reason to choose an EM Tanker over an EM Scrapper...unless of course there was more AOE in the Tanker EM similar to how Fire Melee has 2 AOE powers for Tankers and only 1 for Scrappers.
The solution of giving EM more AOE would be simple, change Total Focus to an AOE like Thunderstrike where it still does Extreme damage to the target but only does moderate damage to enemies around the target. Another solution which would be more controversial is to decrease the damage of Total Focus and change it to an AOE while maintaining only one Extreme damage attack, Energy Transfer and then reinstalling the original faster Energy Transfer animation or speeding up its current animation so the single target damage is not reduced by too much from losing the extreme Total Focus. The end result of the latter change would be slightly less single target damage and significantly greater AOE damage.
I myself believe that Energy Melee should have its AOE increased, especially for Tankers who need it most for Arggo control. With its current weak AOE potential, I believe it is an inadequate primary compared to other primaries for maintaining arggo and if Scrappers are giving Energy Melee, there would no reason to play an EM tanker unless some improvement occurs. Since Tankers should not have more damage than Scrappers, AOE improvement is the best way.
How would you answer this question ? -
Here is my fun build. My other build will probably be for single target.
ICE ARMOR
Hoarfrost
Wet Ice
Frozen Armor
Chilling Embrace
Glacial Armor
Energy Absorption
Hibernate
ENERGY MELEE
Barrarge
Bone Smasher
Whirling Hands
Build Up
Energy Transfer
Total Focus
FITNESS
Swift
Health
Stamina
SPEED
Hasten
LEAPING
Combat Jumping
FLIGHT
Hover or Air Superiority
Flight
ARCTIC MASTERY
Block of Ice
Ice Blast
Ice Storm
So that leaves one power to pick. Since this guy isnt my 1 v 1 build , I just want him to be able to jump into a group of plus 4 enemies and barely have a scratch on him while having good solo efficiency. I currently have about 200 million at my desposal. -
Quote:I will probably post my build after work. I do not know how to use that hero builder or whatever you call it so I will do it the old fashioned way.Originally Posted by Finduilas
My planned build (the character is currently level 32) will have 44.9% S/L def and 44.3 E/NE def without EA. That includes one set of Kinetic Combat and a whole bunch of less expensive IOs.
As Rylas said, Permafrost isn't necessarily a bad pick, it does give a little fire resistance and some slow resistance (which EA also has). IMO, it isn't enough fire resistance to help that much--you'll still definitely have a weakness to fire damage--but it's not entirely useless. I just think there are usually other picks that help more.
If you're using SOs, I'd definitely recommend 6-slotting Hoarfrost 3 Rch/3 Heal. However, using IOs--common or set--you can easily get away with 5 slots instead, just like you can fully slot attacks in 5 slots using IOs.
It would be easier to make suggestions if you could post your build and let us know what your goals are. I tend to assume that players want to soft-cap defense, but I know that's not always the case. -
Quote:So with all my Armors, Energy Absorption, Combat Jumping and that Steadfast IO , one can reach the soft cap ? I thought Weave was almost required.Originally Posted by Finduilas
I'd argue that none of those except the Steadfast +Def is worth the infl for a Ice tanker.
To the OP: Permafrost just takes resist sets, so anything you could put in it would also go in Tough or any other resist power. I think taking Tough would be more beneficial, but it does take 2 power slots compared to one for PF. But since the one resist IO you should really get is the SP +def and that can go into Hoarfrost, IMO it seems like you could find a better use for that power slot than PF.
EDIT: If you really want to go with Flight on your Ice tank, you can. I have an Ice/Axe that has Air Sup/Fly, no CJ, Tough but not Weave, and still manages to soft-cap S/L/E/NE.
Just curious but how many enemies must you hit with EA to be softcapped on your build ?
I am also kinda reluctant to use the Steadfast IO in Hoarfrost. Since it is my main heal, I figured I needed all six slots to enhance the heal and recharge. If placing the Steadfast IO in Hoarfrost is the most logical thing to do, can you dispell my doubts please. -
Quote:What else can I use it for with IOs ?Originally Posted by Finduilas
Permafrost is pretty good as a IO mule if there's nothing else you'd like to take. However, I wouldn't just take it for the Steadfast +Def IO, it can also go into Hoarfrost. You could also pick up Tough and put it there; IMO Tough is a lot more beneficial than Permafrost.
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I am having difficulty in calculating my build. I have two questions about Permafrost.
With IOs can Permafrost Increase Defense ? If so, by how much ?
What else can it increase with IOs other than resistance ?
I find it impossible to fit in the fighting pool to one of my Ice/EM builds so I am looking at other options , like Combat Jumping + Permafrost + Hover (My character concept is flight on this build)
Thanks. -
Quote:It doesn't. It needs to be changed.Originally Posted by Rajani Isa
Don't forget it helps keep them in range of Auras.
So tell me how Vigilance increases a solo defender's solo capabilities?
Who cares ? If you solo mobs only attack you anyway. Tankers should have something better rather than just situationally benefiting from the consequences of the Taunt in Gauntlet.Quote:Originally Posted by Rajani Isa
Used right, Guantlet DOES help even a solo tank, and just because your playstyle doesn't let it be useful solo doesn't mean no one else does. -
I like the Stand Fast idea. Another idea is that instead of a -tohit debuff every so many attacks there can be a -damage debuff. While other Tankers may benefit more from this, I feel any Tanker would welcome an inherent that causes a -damage debuff to multiple enemies every so often, like a 10% chance to cause a 25% damage debuff for 10 seconds.
Or hell make it both a -damage debuff and -tohit debuff so that it helps both resistance and defensive Tankers evenly.
You can justify this inherent as Memphis Bill said, that it makes the enemies reckless by angering them so much or whatever.