Pattern Walker

Since I've been playing a Force Field/Sonic defender lately, I thought about some additional issues with pairing FF with Radiation Blast. (BTW: I am loving Force Fields, nothing I'm saying here should indicate that I'm disparaging the set. It's fantastic with my ranged blast set.)

Given that you want to be in the midst of mobs and using your PBAoE and Targeted AoE's "with impunity", I think that Force Fields might not be the best match for you, at least if you want to get the most out of your primary. The one part of FF that really gives you what you want is Dispersion Bubble, and does exactly what you want. However, FF provides Dispersion Bubble, two ally-only shields, a cage power, a "safe haven" power to recover from combat, an AoE attack, and 3 knockback/repel powers.

Dispersion Bubble and the AoE attack would work very well for what you want to do (mez protection and another AoE that can be used up close), and Personal Force Field lets you heal and recover if things go bad.

However, the three crowd control powers you get would actually work counter to keeping the baddies close and taking damage from you. These powers are really helpful in ensuring your survival on a FF defender, especially solo, but would inhibit your damage-dealing abilities from Irradiate and Neutron Bomb (though less for the latter).

This could mean 2 things: Either you have more room for pool powers (yay!), or you have flexibility in the use of your powers depending on your current health.

However, as FF doesn't offer many tools for mitigation beyond defense (which is not huge without additional pool powers and set bonuses) and knockback, it might not be easy to accomplish your goal (PBAoE damage with safety) with this set.

(edit: See _r0y_'s comments above for a different experience. I would note that _r0y_'s use of Dark Blast actually offers a fair amount of mitigation to add to the shield powers that he took. Dark Blast has the wonderful wonderful to hit debuff, which stacks with the defenses from FF's shields, but also has tools such as Tenebrous Tentacles (immobilize to keep enemies out of melee range with you) and Dark Pit (nice group minion stun) to help cut down your incoming damage. Finally, Dark Blast has a self-heal in the third blast that helps you deal with the damage that does get through. Radiation Blast's secondary effect doesn't provide mitigation, and your only mez (Cosmic Burst) is a single target.)

Storm Summoning also has a similar problem with Hurricane (and Gale, if you were to use it). Hurricane offers wonderful survival tools, but inhibits your PBAoE damage dealing.

Traps, Dark, Cold, Poison, and Time don't have useful/necessary powers that make you choose tradeoffs between survivability and PBAoE damage. Force Fields and Storm do require you to make those tradeoffs.

Lewis,

I have the same experience with Traps. I've played it twice to the 40s (on an MM and a Corruptor), and while I recognize how powerful it is, I just don't enjoy the experience.

I'd recommend you actually look at some other support sets beyond FF and Traps. Dark Miasma, Cold Domination, and Storm Summoning all provide a PBAoE stealth power that provides defense to all (+5% for Defenders, +3.5% on Corruptors, IIRC), and some handy resists to some types. You can build on those numbers by layering in Tough (with the Steadfast +3% defense), Weave, Combat Jumping, Maneuvers, Scorpion Shield (which you can get at lvl 35 now!) and some set bonuses to get very good defenses to S/L/E and some resists against 5 types of damage.

But what about mezzes? you say. The nice thing about defenses is that if you're not hit by the attack, the mezz never gets you. In addition, Tactics, Shadow Fall, and Steamy Mist provide protection and/or resists against confuses and/or fears.

Finally, let me advocate a bit for Acrobatics. Acrobatics gets no love now, due to the knockback protection global enhancements, but Acrobatics provides protection against knockback, and magnitude 2 protection against holds. Many people assume mag 2 protection is worthless, as pretty much any player hold is mag 3 or better, but most of the holds you will encounter from critters will be mag 2 or less. So long as you prevent holds from stacking (use your own mezzes to prevent this!), Acrobatics can significantly cut down on the amount of time you spend held. Holds from boss or higher critters can still be a problem, of course.

I've leveled a specially-built Radiation/Kinetics corruptor who uses Air Superiority, Jump Kick, and Cosmic Burst as my ST attack chain, and Irradiate and Neutron Bomb as my PBAoE attacks. I fight only from melee range. With Acrobatics, Combat Jumping, Tough (+Steadfast), and Weave (and adding Scorpion Shield at 41), I have soloed 95% of the time to level 47. Holds were almost never a problem. The only common mezzes I worry about are stuns. I make sure to hit stunners with Cosmic Burst first thing to cut my risk. Stun them before they can stun you!

Kinetics has no defense to build on within the set, unlike Cold, Dark, and Storm. Also, Time and Poison offer PBAoE powers with -to hit which provide effective defense. If I can do this on a Kin, I'd think any of these sets are equally survivable.

(BTW: I owe the idea for a Rad/Kin melee Corruptor entirely to Luminara's guide to Kinetics Scrappers (sic), found in the Defender forum guides here http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=114451. It's a bit dated now, but awesome still! I have never enjoyed leveling a character so much. I heartily recommend it!)

Five players with the same support powerset on a team is usually the recipe for WIN! This is true even at relatively low levels. This team had everything it needed to roll right through a +2 mission except effective communication and teamwork. (Think about it, 5x stacked Emps, Stormies, Darks, Sonics, FFs, whatever. WIN!)

That said, I think it's okay to walk away, to decide that you're just not up to running the show at a particular time, particularly on a blind invite. But those times you do have the energy and patience to try to get a team working well together can be really helpful to others who might not know how to best play their powersets in a team setting.

Early in my time in the game, I would join PUGs and constantly open with Crushing Field ("there's lots of enemies there, it's an AoE, and I want to be helpful in defeating them!"). Death, and not just my own, I'm ashamed to report, was a constant threat as a result of my presence on those early PUGs.

I have so much reason to be grateful to those patient folks who helped me understand how to play the game more effectively. I've become, I hope, both less annoying on teams and more effective solo as a result of their work. I try to give it back when I can. I also recognize that sometimes I'm too tired/cranky/annoyed to be useful in that way.

(I also look at veteran badges to evaluate how much leeway to give to players, but keep in mind that sometimes it's not the veteran playing at that moment. Sometimes it's the child/girlfriend/boyfriend/whatever just trying out the game. Also with a new powerset such as Time Manipulation, folks really may not have developed a feel for the best way to be useful on a team.)

My decisions about which alignment a character will have is entirely character-driven. Enough of them remain "pure" villain or hero (I tend to prefer redside in general, and rogues in general) that I have plenty of characters who can obtain alignment merits for recipes I require. I just email the recipes around as needed.

The system is flexible enough, and I have alts enough, that I don't feel constrained to shoehorn any particular alt into any particular alignment (other than my badge-hunter, but that's due to badge requirements).

I'm happy with the current alignment structure and rewards.

If the devs were willing to change only one thing about Sonic Resonance, I'd ask them to lower the endurance costs for the set as a whole. Additional debuffs would be great, but folks would still shy away due to the difficulty in running the set.

I believe Group Fly still has a higher flight speed for the character with the power than for anyone else affected by the power. This means that if you fly at full speed, your pets will eventually fall behind and fall out of the sky.

One strategy to cope with that effect is to put yourself on follow to a pet, and navigate that pet around by using the "goto" command. This will insure that you're not traveling faster than your slowest flyer.

Combat while running Group Fly will be problematic, as even ranged pets want to close to melee at times. If you're too far away, they will drop to the ground.

My favorite MM is far from the most uber. If I could only play one MM it would be my Thugs/Poison.

Why? I like the concept of my mad scientist mastermind. Poison gives me plenty to do without feeling overwhelmed or annoyed. Thugs are tough enough to do well even though Poison isn't the most powerful or safest secondary. (With thugs, you can slot all four +def/+res pet uniques by using Gang War, which really helps survivability.) Poison recently got some buffs that are nice. I solo quite a bit, and soloing allows me to run at, say, +3 x1 if I want, as Poison does better with fewer, more difficult targets. Poison is also a good match for a set with a really strong third-tier melee pet, like the Bruiser.

Ultimately, given that you want to level an MM to 50, you need to decide what is most fun. Most MM combinations are easily playable (the worst MM pairing is far more survivable and "go get 'em" powerful than a poor defender/controller/corruptor pairing, for example). Figure out what makes a character compelling to play for you. For some, it's concept. For others, it's sheer power. For a few, it's doing amazing things with less than optimal powersets.

What makes a toon fun for you? You're going to be spending time with a toon you're leveling to 50. Make sure you enjoy it.

Having played both a Huntsman and a Crab to incarnate levels, I find that they have a very similar feel, playwise. They both offer great team buffs to defense, damage, and to hit. They both have good AoE damage, though the Crab pulls a bit ahead in that the Crab-version cones tend to be larger and do more exotic damage. Crabs get more pets and a Dull Pain-like heal and hp buff. The Huntsman keeps a non-redrawing AoE immobilize, has a decent ST debuff from the Bane pool, and generally has a more "open" build.

The difference for me is that the Crab has the backpack, and the Huntsman has a gun.

I suspect that the reason VEATs aren't more popular has to do with people just not finding the concept for them. VEATs aren't quite as easy as other ATs to "fit" any kind of concept to.

Just looking at the two sets made me think that they would have good synergy, it's nice to have confirmation from someone who's played them.

My problem with the two sets is conceptual. I just can't figure out a good character concept that combines these two pretty disparate powersets. I'd love to make an Electric/Poison controller, but anything I can think of seems pretty cobbled-together.

tl;dr: I compare resistance debuff-only powers, then argue that the real problem with Sonic Resonance is endurance cost.

I pretty much only go to the Surgeon tailors (mostly the tailor in Pocket D or RWZ), so that does not seem to be the problem. When I purchased costume slot 6, it made a copy of my second costume for that slot, as every time I've unlocked a new costume on my crab. I can freely switch costumes, I just can't freely alter the costumes in the tailor. (Again, the workaround posted by Zortel does work.)

The instant I try to alter a costume on my crab (other than the VEAT costume), my game completely crashes.

I am consistently having this problem as well. I only became aware of it after purchasing an additional global costume slot through the market, but hadn't tried to change a costume recently on my crab, so I can't say that that is a trigger.

Thanks so much for the workaround, Zortel! I was losing my mind!

In my experience, the arsonist becomes a bit less suicidal after you get the lvl 32 upgrade. I think he picks up another ranged attack so he stops running into melee as often.

The arsonist also cranks out damage. Even if he hangs back, he's an aggro magnet. Keeping him alive really boosts your damage output, so it's worthwhile to keep him living.

Jump Kick does less Scourge, Containment, and Crit damage than would be expected based upon all other pool attacks. I discovered this on a Rad/Kin corruptor I play who uses both Jump Kick and Air Superiority as part of his attack chain. Air Superiority does double damage when scourging, but Jump Kick only does an additional 84% damage.

Checking the detailed information for the power in game and the information at Red Tomax's Power Quantification, this incorrect damage seems to be across the board for Containment and Critical damage as well. This is only true of Jump Kick from the pool power attacks. Air Superiority, Boxing, Flurry, and Kick seem to apply double damage.

Corruptors, Controllers, Scrappers, and Stalkers are all affected by this. I'm not sure if Fury for Brutes is applying correctly for Jump Kick.

I'm hoping we'll get access to the beta forums as well...

Two different things happening. Website maintenance is what was quoted in the OP. That is for the CoH website. Not the servers. The servers are down for weekly maintenance right now, and that maintenance is taking longer than normal, as European Support posted in Announcements.

The server status page at the main website is from 6/24. It's often very out of date. I'm sure the servers are still down for maintenance.