PumBumbler

This is a great idea! Good luck to everyone and thanks to Nuppie for hosting this.

It's people like you and Cai that make Justice the best server out there. Even though Justice is dying. >.>

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZvjPCcHI4g

I like the part where they go parumpapumpum.

I like the fact that people here like to argue with folks who are known not change their minds. Ever. It makes the forums a place where people will never get agree on anything.

Personally, I like the new encounters, I don't think they've gone far enough. In the beginning I thought it was too extreme, but in retrospect, it is quite easy once you understand the mechanics involved. However, it may be too extreme for the current playerbase that has been raised for the last six years on a game that has continually gotten easier instead of harder.

Without a challenge the game itself would be dying a slow and horrible death, which I think it was. Adding new gimmicks and new game play to make things at least have a modicum of threat is absolutely necessary to making the game (endgame) have any worth. Otherwise rewards without any risk aren't very rewarding in the end.

To that end, the developers must confront the fundamental question of how often they want encounters to fail, or tasks to be insurmountable, and by what percentage of the players.

This is the tricky part of game development and I know that pleasing players seeking a greater challenge may alienate other players who think the current challenge is already fine.

Everything before incarnates was always touted as being "optional". The game was balanced around SOs, and you did not need to worry about much else in order to play the game. The economy, IOs, PvP, side switching, all could be ignored and even flouted, and still play the game successfully.

The incarnate system does change that. It requires you to do the incarnate arc before even allowing you to join the new TFs and it penalizes you for not slotting your incarnate.

That gating in itself is upsetting to some folks but personally, I think it is OK as long as the developers don't abandon everyone else in favour of the endgame content only. That means that more 20-50 content should be implemented for Praetoria, but even more content needs to be introduced for the base game (Non GR, non incarnate folks).

Unlike most other MMOs, this game in particular has never been of the hardcore loot and banding of players to a level range with every expansion. It would be a shame if this game solely went to a model like that one where some dragon jumped out of the ocean like some godzilla ripoff.

Where?

Is everyone fighting the EB or AV version of Lady Winter?

Your points are all very good. MMs tend to get stronger and stronger past 32 until level 50, where the system of IOs, set bonuses and Incarnate slotting starts to work for everyone but MMs.

1. Pets are no longer affected by recharge, plus or minus. This was a big whack against MMs, could be because they've been toying with some way to get kinetics ported over to MMs via powerset proliferation? It also means that a huge portion of the enhancement system is lost to MMs. The attack chain starts to flatten out because the attack rate of the pets are capped.

Note that this isn't exactly a bad thing since the AI is so screwy that having too much recharge might just make all of your pets run into brawl range. Not that they don't do that now...

I'd suggest allowing pets to be affected by +/- recharge again. Put a lower cap (for MM henchmen only) on it if you are concerned about MM /kin being OP.

2. Pets are not governed by the 1 shot code. This means the lowest tiers of henchmen will get 1 shotted easily. Over and over in the end game, because level 50 MMs are spawning level 48 and 49 henchmen against level 54 minions and bosses. Only the last pet spawns at the combat level of the caster. That cannot end well, especially given the number of AoEs. When Bobcat can do 5,000 damage to a player character, obviously the henchmen aren't going to be around for long since they can suffer instadeath.

Adding 1-shot code for henchmen shouldn't be a big deal. It would give MMs a chance to heal or retreat their pets.

Add the inherent to level shift MM pets as the MM crafts higher level incarnate gear as part of the normal routine. For example, the first MM level shift would be the -2 (tertiary) henchman being turned to -1 henchmen at the end game, the second level shift for the -1 (secondary) henchman to be even combat level to caster, the third level shift would be for the -2 (tertiary) henchman to be even combat level to the caster, and the fourth level shift would be for the big henchman to be +1 to the caster. That would mean that the eventual incarnate MM would have a single level 51 primary pet and the secondary and tertiary pets would be even level to the caster. Each stage could be added as the capping point to 1 of the 10 phases of incarnate progression (ie. the finish of Alpha would only net the MM the shift of the -2 pets to -1).

Alternatively, the level shift could be from the point of the attacker, so that the level shift happens so the level 54 minion sees the 48 henchman as a 49 henchman, but the tech could make it work that the level shift only affects level 52 and higher bad guys. This would prevent the MM being too overpowering against standard level 50 mobs.

If the tech exists, tie the supremacy distance of the caster to the level shift of the pets.

3. Set bonuses do not apply to pets. Nothing. Nada. Zippo. No bonuses to defense, damage or accuracy. The only ones that apply are the direct pet sets, and they don't give a heck of a lot.

The +def and +res aura bonuses for the pets are only within supremacy distance, so for melee pet MMs it also means getting dangerously close to AoE happy bad guys to give any benefit. That means the pets get dropped really fast and the MM usually gets dropped quickly after that. Bots MMs suffer less from this.

Get rid of the supremacy distance requirement for the pet bonus procs. They should apply all the time, regardless of the distance from the caster. There is already a penalty for losing supremacy buffs on the henchman as well as the MM.

Allow set bonuses (the ones that weren't developed directly for pets) to be applied to pets, but divide the buff amount by the number of pets that can be cast. Procs should affect pets similarly.

4. Speed runs. A lot of TFs now have a lot of mob skipping. Dragging pets along usually means they get stripped off the MM pretty fast due to aggro.

MMs should have the ability to stay their pets to a spot regardless of distance (no rubberbanding), but the pets should not be able to attack or respond to new commands when far away (Instant perma-sleep). MMs should also get the ability to recall all of their pets like a team teleport command on a decently fast recharging basis.