Panzerwaffen

Wow, you summed up AR/Devices in one sentence! A primary with no Aim, coupled with a secondary that lacks a build-up power makes for a pretty neutered blaster.

BBQ Ice Cream?

I've also found this to be true. Most solo players will exit a mission as soon as invited. Some prefer to finish their active mission first, and ask if they can send a tell when done, which I am usually fine with, myself.

Great post overall!

Specifically mid-level recipes.

So you've essentially already made up your mind that any use of inventions is "needlessly time-wasting" & requires "grinding" without really having any experience with it at all? If you've already made up your mind about it, why bother arguing about it here, other than for the sake of argument?

If you find the idea of the invention system repulsive due to your preconceptions, and personal compulsions, great, nothing wrong with that at all. That's the beauty of this game. It caters to vastly different playstyles so well. But, again, why expend all the effort arguing about it in this thread, when it really just comes down to your personal preferences?

I slot every character I make with set IO's, starting as early as level 12. Some get a mix of frankenslotting and common IO's, others use full IO sets, and a few get the real good stuff. In almost two years of playing this game, I seriously doubt if I've actually purchased more than a dozen or two SO's, between both my accounts. It barely takes any time or inf at all to grab a bunch of commonly available IO recipes off the market and get them slotted up. Doing this, I can get SO level performance as early as level 17, and start to pull significantly away from the SO curve by level 22.

In a way, that is my own compulsions at work. I hate the idea of an enhancement slot that provides what I perceive as substandard (SO) value.

There's a vast gulf between an expensive build with all the shinies and the basic use of IO sets or frankenslotting. It seems to me as if you are using the most extreme case simply to rationalize your complete avoidance of the invention system.

Sam, I think your argument is pretty ridiculous too. In very little more time than it took you to type out your post you could have purchased, crafted, and slotted a dozen or more readily available uncommon set IO's. All of which would offer more enhancement value than an SO, and never expire.

What it really comes down to, with all due respect, is your own compulsions are what prevents you from utilizing the invention system, not any inherent barriers or difficulty in the system itself. There's nothing wrong with that, but arguing about it is pretty pointless...

Not at all.. Between Personal Force Field, Temp Invulnerability, Force of Nature, Eye of the Magus, and nearly capped HP, my AR/EM blaster is pretty damn survivable against large groups. And that's without a large amount of ranged defense..

It's really not all that hard to add a significant amount of survivability to blasters.

If you're trying to avoid popular builds, Fire/MM probably isn't for you then. It's only slightly less FotM than Archery/MM.

Archery, Assault Rifle and Fire are the AOE blaster primaries. Secondaries that work best with those from a ranged AOE perspective would be EM and MM, in my experience.

EM gives you Build-Up at level 4. You get Boost Range (great w/ AR's cone attacks), Conserve Power and Power Boost for utility. You also get hard hitting melee attacks with excellent DPA.

MM has an extra AOE cone in Psychic Scream & a PbAOE attack in Psychic Shockwave, along with Drain Psyche for regen/recovery.

I take it you've never been on an LRSF run where sleeps were used to single pull the Freedom Phalanx, or an ITF where the nicti were completely neutralized by being slept...

I think he's going for broke here....

ETA: I think I could actually hear the exasperation coming through my screen from your post, Hyper..

I'm not sure of a better way to explain it, than to simply drop an example on you.

Take two 6 slotted attacks.

Attack one is slotted with SO's. Accuracy, 3xDamage, Endurance, Recharge.
Total values are: 95% Damage, 33% each for Accuracy, Endurance, Recharge.

Attack two is slotted with a mix of uncommon level 35 set IO's as follows:
A/D/R
A/E/R
D/E/R
A/D
D/E
D/R

Total values for attack two are: 60% Accuracy, 96% Damage, 60% Endurance Reduction, and 77% Recharge Reduction.

So you're not getting any more damage really because of the ED caps, but you'd be getting nearly double the accuracy & endurance reduction and more than twice the recharge reduction vs. SO's in the same 6 slots.

This is a good point. Even if just about every serious powergamer out there was trying to run TF's at max speed for merits (which I don't believe for even a moment is true), the ratio of those serious powergamers to the rest of the player population is very likely so small that it wouldn't skew the averages at all.

In all fairness to Megajoule, I think she has realized some of the problems with her suggestion...

Based on the above, I don't think he has a very good understanding of how the CoX market works at all.

Wouldn't Pain Domination be a better secondary to go along with my petless MM whip mistress?

Right, but the Buy-Out price doesn't show the actual listed selling prices, it simply shows whatever amount the seller want to set as a buy-it-now price.

Yes, there are time limits on auctions in WoW, as well as players bidding against each other. Counter bids increase the time limit left on an auction, and bidders don't win until the auction time runs out, unless they Buy-Out. It is a totally different system, and HK seems to be simplistically focusing on the Buy-Out function to the exclusion of all else.

If anything, I would think that the type of system where bidders don't actually get the item until the auction ends unless they use Buy-Out, would only lead to an increase in the BUYITNAO attitude. HK seems like the epitome of the BUYITNAO player, and I have to wonder how much of that attitude is a result of the WoW auction system.

I don't see how it would have much of an impact either to be honest. Let's way I regularly work a niche on Crushing Market: Chance for Tears. The average selling price is 10 million. I currently list mine for 4.5 million and they routinely sell for 10 million anyway. With a buy-out system (which is optional in WoW, as far as I understand it), I'd just set my buy-out price at slightly over 10 million. I'd love to know how this would drive down prices, when I'm already listing items well under the average going rate.

Sorry, but the burden is on you to show us how it would improve the system, not the other way around.

Damnit! You mean I'm not going to get to play my Mind Control/Whip Assault Dominator?!?!?

I'm seriously impressed. I think you hit every dead horse out there with that epic spew of nerdrage. I could almost feel the spittle flying from your frothing mouth.

out of

Bravo, sir!