Nozybida

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Isn't that Seismic Smash from Stone Melee?

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Someone give this man a cookie. I do believe the power in question is Seismic Smash. It is also used in the Electric Manip line , the power Thunder Strike as noted above. Another cookie for Screwloose.

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3. The Tanker doesn't "feel" like a comic book Tanker should. And frankly, this one really, really bothered me. Because our game is a comic book MMP.

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That quote right there is where everyone is going wrong. "comic book Tanker" There are no Tankers in comic books. There are what I have always refered to as Comic Book Bricks, but there are no Tankers.

Well, okay, maybe The Blob, but aside from that the Tanker Arcehtype doesn't really function like any comic book character. Sure their powersets are meant to recreate the Comic Book Brick "feel" but the main game function of a tanker is to take damage, as stated by Statesman himself.

If this was the design philosophy, if "to take damage" was the original role envisioned by the devs, is it really any surprise to him now that "The Tanker doesn't "feel" like a comic book Tanker should."

I'm not sure how they can dig themselves outta this hole now, and I'm not sure they should try. The tanker role does fill a nice niche in this MMO. It shouldn't try to be confused with any relation to comic books at this point though. Instead make the tanker fit their role in a better way. As is, the best way a tanker can perform his given function is to take Provoke and go around insulting the mobs.

If we want to make some meaningful changes to the Tanker Archetype we need to find some ways to make their role in combat more fun and less passive. Making Provoke a Tanker secondary power would at least free up a power pool for players but wouldn't do anything to make them more fun.

Being able to select and defend teammates from incoming attacks seems more heroic, but would it be more fun? Being able to deflect and block incoming attacks would be more dramatic, but would it be any less passive? Guess it depends how it was implemented. Maybe someone else can come up with some better ideas to make the tanker role more fun.

One of my big beefs with the tanker archetype is their lacking of quality mobile mez protections. Rooted effects make the game less fun and force more cookie cutter builds. Know why my Regen Scrapper is a lot more fun then my Invuln tanker? Well, okay one of the reasons? He can move! he can flow through battles. He can position himself and take advantage of his powers. He has freedom to fight who he pleases when he pleases. He doesn't have to avoid DE or Rikti mezzers. he doesn't have to wait for his one buddy with Clear Mind to hop on before taking on a mission. He just goes and does it. Fixing this issue alone would go along way to making tankers more fun to play.

Now as for the issue of "Because our game is a comic book MMP". Want a comic book feel, want to be able to make a real Comic Book Brick? You already have an archetype that could accomplish that. They are called Scrappers. Give them some powersets that give the right flavor and you are all set. No further tweaks required.

You let the those who seek the Comic Book Brick feel free to make the heroes they want, and you make those who want to be MMO Tankers better and more active at their roles. That is the only way I see that you could possibly make both sides of the tanker community happy.

Mucho Gracias for the info!

Thanks, I was able to find it tonight. Guess I am just blind.

Looking for some more info on two plaques in particular.
1) Perez Park: CitizenCrimeAct5 -(-2633, 0, 378) Just inside the park wall, north of Atlas entrance.
I wasn't able to find this one. Are the coordinates correct and I'm just blind or is there some info I am missing here?

2) Terra Volta: SpankyRabinowitz6
Any info at all on this yet?

I have updated the spreadsheet with some more info. If you find any additional info or corrections let me know.
badges.xls

Here is the badge/plaque list in an Excel Spreadsheet. Useful for keeping track of which badge/plaque you have already collected.
badges.xls

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Straight up punching - like a street fighting set - definitely, it'll happen, but not soon.

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Then wy don't we port some of the Tanker or Blaster secondaries into the Scrapper Primaries? Energy Melee and Super Strength are obvious ones that should have been available to scrappers to begin with!

I understand it takes time for animations/etc to create a new powerset, that is why so many people have been asking for something along the lines of using the existing powersets to supplement the scrapper lines.

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If i saw batman getting his cowl cleaned by 3 of the jokers henchmen I'd give up comics. If they differntiated things a bit.... say rikti minons were stronger than crey security guards.... or 5th super soldiers were more of a threat than your average street hoodlum....maybe it would make sense. but they've made no such distinction. a minion is a minion is a minion is a wimp.

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Very good point. If Rikti minion is somehow supposed to be tougher than a Crey minion (which in comic books they would be) there needs to be some way of idnetifying that, and having a reward concurrent with that risk. As it is now all minions are treated the same.

Is a Crey scientist whose main attack is Brawl supposed to be as deadly as a Rikti Soldier with an energy cannon? Should we really swallow the fact that the reward for defeating each should be the same?

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On the post about the purple patch - yes, if groups could street sweep higher level critters at a wider range, then sure, the issue would be resolved. Missions, however, would continue to be simple - and therefore worthless for XP.

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Then why don't we fix missions? Where is the difficulty slider? Why does the mission scaling not reflect the premise you just stated above?

Why don't we fix the things that make a group of 8 heroes worthless instead of nerfing the entire gaming community into this 1 hero=3 minion mold?

At level 5 sure, 3 minions should pose a threat. At level 35 though? I don't see anything heroic about having a high level hero afraid of 3 Security Guards with billy clubs, or running in fear every time they see a Lt.

Are we heroes or not? Are we supposed to grow in power over time or not? Are we just supposed to be sidekicks for the game's real heroes (Statesman, Back Alley Brawler, etc)?

I didn't sign on to be Statesman's sidekick! I signed on to become a super hero (in a virtual world obviously) all my own.

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Ah - therein lies the issue. Personally, I see the level 40 minion in a whole class than a level 5 minion. They're from other dimensions. They're equipped to the teeth with experimental weaponry. They're giant robots bristling with missiles.

When you say "they're not different", it's straw man because I never said that the rank (i.e. minion) changes meaning over levels. To me, the difference is, and should be the level.

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States' I'm seeing a lot of "I see"'s and "To me"'s in your posts lately. Ok, fine, it is your game and your baby. At some point though you are going to need to reconcile "Your Vision" with what the player base and the game design have presented.

Your attempts at forcing players to see the game the way you see it are very short sighted. Guess that is your prerogative, your game and all. I think it is a dangerous way to shape this game though. You risk losing much more than you are going to gain.

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Under this scenario, a team of 8 heroes would be facing 240 minions in a single mission room. I don't need to point out that 1) the rooms aren't big enough for this and 2) most video cards aren't good enough for this. You'd end up with exactly what we have now - small groups hunting massive spawns, while the larger groups are penalized because there's nothing challenging enough for them.

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Isn't that the exact reason why we have been complaining about the Pruple Patch? The fact is larger groups would have to fight higher level villians for an appropriate challenge and reward. That came to an end with the PP.

The sun has long since settled over the horizon of Independence Port. The cold chill of the sea breeze raises goose bumps along the back of even the most hardened hero. Soon thugs of all shapes and sizes will be making the citizens of Paragon tremble in fear under the cover of the darkness.

From his perch high atop a loading crane, The Dark Avenger spots a group of Tsoo warriors go about their nightly rounds. This time a simple business man who refused to pay their protection money is being assaulted in an alley way.

"Look down there Birdboy." The Dark Avenger's steely voice alerts his sidekick to the activities below. "The Tsoo are pressing their advantage here in the port. Someone should put a stop to this."

"Right Dark Avenger!" The young sidekick prepares to jump into the foray after his mentor. "Lets set these guys straight."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, there my young sidekick. Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. I count 2 Lieutenants sorcerers and 3 inkmen minions. Maybe we should call in the Justice Squad for some backup."

Birdboy's jaw drops as The Dark Avenger, Protector of Innocents, Keeper of Peace, Defender of Truth, pulls his Justice Squad Communicator from his utility belt.

"You can't be serious?" Asks the stunned sidekick.

"Dark Avenger calling on all Justice Squad members. We have a code yellow here. Requesting back-up"

Shriek! The Dark Avengers communicator shrieks as the calls from the rest of the Justice Squad filter in. Each hero seems to be held up with his own attempts at battling evil.

"Tauntman here. Got my hands full in Brickstown. I ran across 3 Crey scientists, this might take a while. At least there aren't any Mob Specialists with billy clubs. If I can get to your position I will."

Shriek!

"Dark Avenger? Wonder Chick here. I'm near your position, at the hospital actually. Ran across two Capo Muscles and a Consigliore. I didn't stand a chance. I'll be right there."

Shriek!

"Green Lightbulb here. I'll be right there. This mission is impossible anyway. There's a frickin BOSS in here, no way in hell I can handle that. Stupid contacts. Don't they know I can't handle anything more than 3 minions?"

Shriek!

"Hey DA, This is StormFire. I got Hawk Woman, Speedy Guy, and Martian Man with me. We got our hands full here in Dark Astoria. It'll be awhile till we can get there. Why do all of these mobs have a stinkin Totem in it? No way we can take these guys out."

etc, etc, you get the point.

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...Heck, a single +4 should be a challenge to several heroes

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Well, the problem is, is there any feeling of being heroic at that point? Sure at level 5 as a fledgling hero a group of thugs should be a hard fought battle.

At level 40? So taking on 3 even level Crey scientists should be the extent of my heroes ability to solo, even after his powers have matured and he is supposedly seen as a protector of the innocents and guardian of justice? That seems more like a sidekick to me.

The current problems with grouping as has been pointed out, is risk -vs- reward. You seem to see it as a con issue. Fact is, people will always find the sweet spot in any system.

When people start farming Nemesis in PI because the Rikti Crash site is too hard should our first response be to make the Nemesis equally hard? Seems to be the direction we are headed, but I think it is a very bad move. Reason people don't go the crash zone is because Rikti can be very frustrating to fight with all the mezzing and the risk doesn't present any additional reward. I don't think making all the mobs frustrating is the way to go.

Now if those same Rikti were left alone, and just as hard, but the reward for getting a team together to fight them was sufficient, then you would see people forming teams and cleaning up the crash zone.

I think forcing everyone down to fighting whites is a bad direction to take. I can't imagine how long it is going to take to level at 30+ now. It took forever to level fighting groups of 10 reds! Now I will be forced to fight 3 Whites!! Holy treadmill Batman!

Much as you don't want to face it, the Purple Patch and PP lite are what killed grouping. It artificially restrained us from finding that sweet spot. People found that what we could fight solo wasn't much different than what we could fight in a group. I don't think the solution of retarding what we can fight solo is the answer. The "Purple Patch" broke grouping, becareful the upcoming "White Patch" doesn't break the game.

I must say that change #1 is more than welcome. I wouldn't go so far as to say it will make provoke unnecessary, but it will certainly help lighten the load.

#2, eh, I might have been excited about that two months ago. Since then I have had the chance to level up a scrapper and see how well built they are, almost tailor made for the comic book brick role. Is this change really going to give tankers a comic book feel? Guess we'll have to wait and see. I have serious reservations about how this would be implemented. How will AoE attacks scale, and trigger damage buffs? What sort of caps will be put in place to limit tanker damage? I still think most of those looking for a comic book style brick will be searching for something more after this.

Lets face it, tankers are the meatshields. They are quite good at it, and I don't know many scrappers that could tank the way a tanker can. At this point should we really try to shoe horn tankers into something they were not meant to be, the way scrappers were shoe horned into the boss killer role?

Even after this goes in, I still say the best way to get that comic book brick feel is to allow more cross archetype sharing of powers. A SS scrapper will still be what many people are looking for, and would certainly solve the problem of not being able to feel like that comic book brick.

This change is already a move to make tankers MORE like scrappers to make people happy. Why not just allow us to be scrappers to begin with? The mechanics may be different but giving tankers a damage buff per successful hit accomplishes the same thing that criticals did for scrappers, raises your damage over time. Making the two archetypes more similar seems silly to me at this point.

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You know what would make me, and a lot of people asking for "comic book tankers", insanely happy? A Broadsword Scrapper (with knockback instead of a def debuff, or at least the choice) with Super Strength animations, sounds, and power names.

Hardly unbalancing, if you don't already think Broadsword Scrappers are not balanced.

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You sir get an A+. That is the real problem with Super Strength, it is a Tanker only powerset. I think it is obvious a lot of us want to paly a scrapper to begin with, but character concepts based on Super Strength had to be morphed into the tanker mold.

Is there any real question as to why we are unhappy with the Tanker SS power set? Getting rid of Knockback made the set a whole lot less super. That isn't the powersets fault though, that is a lack of mobile mez resitance in the Primaries problem. The End useage is a Tanker Archetype problem, and I am glad it is being addressed.

The damage issue is a character concept problem. Changing KO Blow does little for the set as a whole. It may bring it more into the realm of the other tanker sets, but in the long run is it really going to make those who wish to make comic book bricks happy? I doubt it. After the initial giddyness fades away, the set is still sub-par for the character concept of a comic book brick.

I don't really see anyway to fix tankers to make those who want a comic book brick happy. Being a tanker will always be about taking damage, being a meatshield. That my friends is not a comic book brick. That is your standard RPG warrior/tanker whatever you want to call it, and that is all it will be.

Guys, I appreciate the discussion on Unyielding Stance and Unstoppable. It is a good one, but this is not the appropriate place for it.

This is the Super Strength thread.

I reposted a few comments here for everyone's discussion since it had already been touched upon there.
What is wrong with tanks

Let's not clutter up Krunch's thread and distract those interested in discussing Super Strength.

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Gang,
I'm holding off on touching Super Strength until we tackle a somewhat greater issue with Tankers - namely that they lack that "comic book feel." Specifically, you'd like to see Super Strength be something somewhat, well, "Hulk-ish." But currently, Super Strength is a poor cousin to Scrapper powers - which seems somewhat out of place. Don't worry - what we're looking at as a fix for ALL Tankers addresses this issue.

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Well at least that gives us some light at the end of the tunnel. Before Issue 2 hit test, I was hoping that some changes would be made to get my tanker out of retirement. Maybe Issue 3 now?

Thanks for the reply States', it is good to know you are hearing our concerns, and I look forward to seeing what you have in mind.

Now if you wouldn't mind, quit being so coy and give us some insight so we can flame each other all to [censored] about it's impact on the game.

Excellent post Silverblade, very well put. In fact if it wasn't for Invuln tripping over its own feet, the Knockback issue would be a moot point for most of us. If we (Invuln and Stone) could actually be mobile during a battle KB would be the most "super" thing about super strength. I am afraid losing KB will just make the set even worse, not better.

When I say worse I don't mean from a min/max point of view or even a game mechanics point of view. Tankers are the only ones that get SS because it "adds flavor to the archetype". Well, SS's flavor just went right out the door. As Krunch has elequently stated it is still underpowered even with the changes on test, and now it doesn't even have the flavoring to hold it over.

The solution presented attacks the problem all wrong. People don't hate KB, people hate being rooted! Having KB only compunds that.

So take KB out of SS, great. We are still rooted! What about those energy blasters, MA scrappers, the pets from illusion controllers, force field defenders, and on and on and on. Did we really gain anything except for a marginal DPS increase when soloing?

States' read this again
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Then take the classic: The Inv/SS tanker with flight. A concept so widely regarded as "superhero" that even in parodies a typical "Superhero" flies, is super strong and very resilient.

But just the classic is the most clunky build available! Click on flight, and loose access to a whopping 3 powers, becuase they "only work on the ground": Unyielding stance, Hurl, Footstomp. Wee! Dogfights? No chance, many fliers, especially high level ones, have status effects out the wazoo - take it to the air, you're likely the first one to pummel to the ground. No grabbing something, flying up and hurling it, since you need the ground for "ammunition". You stand down there in US and rooted and have the flyer pelt you for eternity with his ranged attacks. No PBAoE in the air, there's nothing there to stomp. My scrapper with spin on the other hand....

Then, Handclap + US and Invincibility: Invinc gets stronger the more mobs you have around yourself. Handclap is a no-damage PBAoE with knockback and a stun. When you use Handclap while USed and Invinced you're off *worse* than before using the power because everything flies in every direction and start to run (while stunned!) into every direction because it's now also outside Invinc's aggro range, and you're rooted and your defense and tohit numbers plummet because all the mobs are out of melee range. Drop US to run after them, their status effects will affect you and you'll likely take lots of damage.

Rooting status protection is a paradox anyway: "Hey villain, to protect me from your root, I'll root myself, hah, and now I laugh at you cause I spoiled your plan! Hahahaaa!"

Reminds me a lot of the guy in Mystery men that could turn invisible only while noone was looking. A self-defeating power. Woot.

Then SS gets a damage buff that has the potential to get yourself killed especially in those cases where you need it. Can be mitigated by US and Unstoppable. And we're either back to the paragraph above or we need to switch to the final power in Invul's set: Unstoppable.

Which almost kills you every 2 minutes and gives you a lot of what you have already plenty of: Resistance, plus a stamina rec boost, and mobile status protection. Most take it to get rid of US's root, but it pales in comparison with other level 32 powers from other powersets. It's really not that great but the best (and only!) alternative to US you have. Another power that, unless heavily slotted to make it permanent, hinders you more than it helps. US does more damage to you by itself than the entire fight would ever do! For a power whose primary purpose it is to mitigate damage it does an awful lot of it!

And Unstoppable alone - unlike nova or the like - does not defeat a single mob. And it's not even really needed against anything even con or con+1.

The entire build manages to completely fall over its own feet, continually. I doubt there's as much self defeating combinations in powersets as there are here. Inv/SS tanks don't fight the environment, they fight their own shortcomings. That's their biggest challenge. The amount of slotting/planning to make this particular build even *work* is mind boggling - and, IMHO, outdoes any (certainly valid) complaints about underpowered powers from other sets (across ATs) in severity.

The Inv/SS tanker is "gimped" by default. And all the suggestions made herein barely touch the surface of what's needed to make the character "play smooth" as Krunch so aptly put it.

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That's not quite how it works. Not being sk'ed, if the level range is too great, the low level hero wouldn't get any xp at all.

The PL'ing technique that is going on when you see people sitting at the tram involves manipulating the sk's level range so the low level hero gets major XP.

Take one higher level hero and he joins a team with a mid ranged level hero. The mid range level hero sk's a low level hero to -1 his own level (notice there is usually another hero with that low level at the tram). The higher level hero then goes and rounds up boatloads of mobs and kills them quickly. Thus giving the lowest level toon tons of kills at the xp cap.

I'm not sure exactly where the level ranges are the best. I think it is around High level toon is X lvl, mid range is X-7, and the sk'ed low level is then X-8, or something like that. There is a point where a level difference either way garners less xp for the low level toon.

They only thing that bugs me, is that fact that it throws the leveling curve out of whack. If you have tons of people being pl'ed (take a look at the Bricks or FF trams) the dev's will see a levling trend that is actually much faster than what people who actually play the game can reach.

Then you start to see things like increased minion hit points, mobs taking on new abilities and tactics to defeat players, mobs built specifically to slow everyone down (any of that starting to sound familiar?).

All this does in the end is slow down the casual players, and really anyone who isn't pl'ing/exploiting, and usually doing little to slow down the type of players who caused the imbalance to begin with.

Some say it might not impact me, but it does. The playstyle itself and the tactics they use I have no problems with. The negative side-effects on the rest of the community I do.