Patteroast

Does some Vanguard-related thing display coordinates that are actually that spot? If so, my guess is that whoever wrote the coordinates into the game picked them essentially at random. If it's in Rhode Island, I guess they at least did their homework and made sure the coordinates fit.

I'm usually teaming quite a lot on Infinity, in small teams with friends and also PUGs, across most level ranges... but my computer recently died, so it'll be at least a month if not several before I can do so again.

It might be good to take a look at more active channels than the ones you have. They go up and down in popularity over time.

Synapse: 23
Back Alley Brawler: 46
Manticore: 17+1=18
Sister Psyche: 29-1=28

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead
Positron: Dead

Synapse: 23-1=22
Back Alley Brawler: 47
Manticore: 16+1=17
Sister Psyche: 29

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead
Positron: Dead

Synapse: 22
Back Alley Brawler: 46
Manticore: 16+1=17
Sister Psyche: 31-1=30

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead
Positron: Dead

Synapse: 21-1=20
Back Alley Brawler: 47
Manticore: 17+1=18
Sister Psyche: 30

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead
Positron: Dead

Synapse: 20-1=19
Back Alley Brawler: 46
Manticore: 18+1=19
Positron: 2
Sister Psyche: 29

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

We seem to have a slight disagreement, Chyll.

Very nice work! It sounds like some amazing things have been done with petless MMs when fully utilizing the invention and incarnate systems.

The advice I gave earlier was based solely on under-twenty experience, leveling up while not rich. It's impressive, but not surprising, that with enough money and effort in minmaxing one can gather enough procs, bonuses, and incarnate powers to make a petless masterminds good... with enough of those things, ANYTHING can be good. I'm not trying to diminish the achievement, I'm just saying that that build says more about mastering some of the game systems than the inherent ability of petless masterminds.

I still stand by what I said. Even without lots of resources, petless masterminds are possible. But they're incredibly slow, and only worthwhile in the sense of getting satisfaction from doing what shouldn't be feasible. However, if you build precisely enough, and throw enough money at them, by fifty they can apparently be reasonably playable!

Synapse: 20-1=19
Back Alley Brawler: 46
Manticore: 17+1=18
Positron: 4
Sister Psyche: 28

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

Synapse: 20-1=19
Back Alley Brawler: 45
Manticore: 19+1=20
Positron: 4
Sister Psyche: 27

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

Synapse: 22-1=21
Back Alley Brawler: 44
Manticore: 17+1=18
Positron: 5
Sister Psyche: 27

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

Possible? Yes. Worth it? No. I have one. He's rather terrible.

I made a petless MM just to have a petless MM, and I picked Necromancy/Force Field. His name's Zombob. Think of a Defender that is terrible at soloing, and how slow it is going through a mission like that. Multiple that by ten. I've never experienced playing this game more slowly than with Zombob.

However, I can say from that experience that it's definitely possible to solo. I only play him very rarely, when I'm particularly bored with... doing well... and he's level 16. A couple levels ago, I did manage to solo an Elite Boss (mostly by spamming Force Bolt to keep him from murdering my face.) During one of the Incarnate tests on Beta when there was a level bump to 50, I tried out my build for him at 50, with a silly number of strange pools, and terrible ideas like five-slotted Air Superiority for extra damage. It went moderately faster than at 16, but stil... about the slowest level 50 I've ever seen.

The few times I've been on a team with Zombob, I weakly blast away and make extra sure to keep people shielded. My search comment is a warning about my petlessness, which actually brought curious people to ask me to team on two occasions. Also, a friend of mine felt sorry for Zombob and made him another petless Mastermind to have as a friend. That team was... um.... something special. Not in a positive sense.

Wow, I didn't think of this until now, but I21 will be a problem for my silly ancient level 1 character, Original Name. I made him when I first set up the test server (Issue 4 beta, I believe), and left him in Outbreak and forgot about him for a couple years. Then I remembered him, and wrote him a weird backstory about how he's been banished to Outbreak forever, even put him in a supergroup named 'Guardians of Outbreak'. He mainly exists because I find it amusing that a level 1 in the tutorial has so many badges, even an Ouroboros Portal (because he has the first two anniversary badges, which unlock the 5th Column gladiator, which for whatever reason counts as time travel...)

Hopefully people parked ahead of time should stay, since I've heard that there are still people in the Paragon Dance Party, at least as of a year or two ago. It's a bug, but a rather long-standing bug, because they don't seem to ever delete zones, just disconnect them. I think the old Faultline and Rikti Crash Site might be in the game files still, too.

Synapse: 19-1=18
Back Alley Brawler: 42
Manticore: 22+1=23
Positron: 9
Sister Psyche: 23

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

Synapse: 20-1=19
Back Alley Brawler: 42
Manticore: 20+1=21
Positron: 10
Sister Psyche: 23

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

Synapse: 21-1=20
Back Alley Brawler: 41
Manticore: 20
Positron: 10+1=11
Sister Psyche: 23

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

Synapse: 21-1=20
Back Alley Brawler: 40
Manticore: 20
Positron: 11+1=12
Sister Psyche: 23

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

Synapse: 21-1=20
Back Alley Brawler: 41
Manticore: 19+1=20
Positron: 11
Sister Psyche: 23

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Dead

One point that I haven't seen made in this debate is the fact that, even ignoring anything on the Paragon Market, Issue 21 will be a nicely-sized issue for VIPs. Sure, you might not think it's big enough, but if you compare it to other issues in the past, it's definitely not one of the lightest ones. Completely ignoring content that came in expansions and booster packs for the moment, practically everything that's come to subscribers without extra money has come in two to four chunks per year. Considering that normal issues are going to continue happening, saving up your points to get extra goodies ends up being the equivalent of an extra issue or two per year included with your subscription. And for the first time, if you don't want to wait six months for new stuff, you can buy it right now! Hooray!

As for Premium and Free players, any complaints will always run up against one irrefutable fact: before CoH: Freedom, if you didn't pay your subscription, you got access to NOTHING. Even with restrictions, everything you get is gain, there is zero loss.

Synapse: 21-1=20
Back Alley Brawler: 41
Manticore: 19
Positron: 12+1=13
Sister Psyche: 22

Petless Masterminds. Even then, I managed to solo an elite boss on mine in the mid-teens...

There really is just about nothing in this game that is entirely unplayable. Sure, there's a lot of variations in effectiveness (depending on what you're looking for as 'effective', or course.)

I have a feeling that I'd be interested in trying out a lot of things that could be suggested in this thread. The first three suggestions all made me think, "That doesn't sounds so bad..."

My non-incarnate non-softcapped Energy/Energy Stalker can handle either large groups of lower level enemies (say, ten whites) or small groups of higher level enemies (four reds) when solo. I just try to take out toughest enemies first with AS, placate or mez others, and scrap the rest using self-buffs, heals, and inspirations to ease any damage I'm taking. If things start looking suddenly bleak (most when I decide to try ten reds, or a rather nasty enemy group), I hit my tier 9 (Overload), Demonic, or if neither are up, run off to heal up and mop up the rest afterwards.

Synapse: 21-1=20
Back Alley Brawler: 38
Manticore: 21+1=22
Positron: 14
Sister Psyche: 21

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Dead
Numina: Re-Dead

Try whatever sounds interesting. Despite what some min-maxers say, it's hard to really gimp yourself.

I'd also recommend trying out multiple characters. Just about all the powersets have some interesting aspects that make them different to play, don't just try the 'best' ones. I'm not saying avoid them, Ninjitsu for example is a nicely designed set and well worth trying, just remember that everything is quite playable. Most of all, have fun! As long as you're doing that, you're never playing the wrong way.

Synapse: 45-1=44
Back Alley Brawler: 65
Manticore: 46+1=47
Positron: 39
Sister Psyche: 45

Statesman: Dead
Citadel: Not Alive
Numina: Extra Dead