Redlynne

"So what's 'Epic' about Kheldians?"

Two things, Grasshopper.

1. The skill to plan a build for them in Mids'.
2. The skill level required to play one in any team size from 1 to 8.

Mothership Raid story ...

So I'm on a Mothership Raid with my main, Redlynne, my MA/SR who has mastered the art of NO GET HITSU.

During the raid, I see some loner trying to hold out against three Rikti Magus. So naturally I go to help out. Unfortunately, some *more* Rikti Magus spawn while we're fighting and they manage to take down my temporary companion, because by now there's four Rikti Magus dogpiling on us. So I've got a faceplanted raidmate beside me, and four pissed off Rikti Magus trying to get me.

Then I see yet another Rikti Magus a ways away along the rim around the center there who's making life difficult for the squishies down in the center. So I do what any self respecting scranktroller would do under the circumstances. I use Warrior's Challenge on him. And predictably enough, he comes over to join the dogpile that's trying to smother me.

So now I've got FIVE RIKTI MAGUS on me ... and I keep needing to use Warrior's Challenge every so often because one of them keeps wanting to break off to go annoy people in the center ... who still haven't noticed that I could "use a little help" over here. And I'm so busy trying to stay alive that I haven't got time to shout out that I've got five Rikti Magus over here trying to steal my lunch money.

All I can say is ... it's a good thing I've got Aid Self or I never would have made it!

About four minutes or so later, the cavalry finally arrives ... and people are simply shocked to find that there's a lone scrapper underneath this dogpile of *five* Rikti Magus who has not only managed to stay alive (at times, just barely), but also managed to hold their aggro so as to keep the center of the ship safe. People were actually asking me how I'd managed to stay alive, without support ... and how long I'd been holding aggro from these five.

Once the cavalry arrived, it was just a matter of mopping up and moving on to kicking the butts of the next spawn group. But what really made people's jaw drop was when I pulled the same stunt AGAIN ... on the same raid ... AND LIVED ... again.

The second time the cavalry came around and found me holding the aggro of five Rikti Magus on myself to protect the center of the ship, some of whom had "rescued" me from the first such situation I'd been in, someone asked me ... "Damn Red! How did you find all of these?!?"

My answer was short and to the point ... "Rikti Magus are my natural prey."

ITF Scrapperlock story ...

My main, Redlynne, is a MA/SR who mastered the art of NO GET HITSU. It's been something of a running gag ever since Issue 3 that my scrapper was more tanker than scrapper since I placed greater emphasis on de-FENCE!! than on offense.

So we're on the third ITF mission dealing with the robot control box. Just as we get the box down to 25% ... meaning the last wave of bots wakes up ... the team wipes.

EXCEPT FOR ME.

And since everyone had been focusing on the control box, rather than taking down the bots ... I'm now taking fire from just about every single bot guarding the control box, and I've got to beat down the last 20% or so by myself. Fortunately, at least four of my teammates (who were all SG friends) faceplanted around the control box near me, meaning they could pass me inspirations while I continued to fight.

... and fight.
... and fight ...
... and FIGHT ...
... AND FIGHT!

It must have been about 3 minutes later after I've been steadily whittling down the control box on my lonesome (I'm not the most DPS heavy scrapper you've ever seen) that the comments start coming from the team, NONE of whom went to the hospital ...

"My GOD ... you're still going?!"
"Holy ..."
"I do not believe this ..."

When I got the box down under 10%, and it started to look like I might actually pull this out(!) one of the dead blasters started chanting, "Redlynne! It's your birthday! It's your birthday!"

Meanwhile I'm popping little lucks every so often to counter the def debuffs I'm taking from the occasional hits leaking through my softcapped defenses that I'm almost constantly taking from all those bots taking potshots at me all the time. And in the middle of all of this, I'm still managing to use Aid Self (no interrupt reduction!) and green skittles when Aid Self isn't ready and I'm getting low on green bar.

*FINALLY* ... after several minutes (I have no idea of how many!) ... I finally break the control box, the bots all topple over ... and there is ... SILENCE.

My inspiration tray is nearly empty, and I'm pretty sure that everyone within gifting distance was nearly empty too ... aside from the wakies, which start going off all over the place when it's clear that REDLYNNE WINS.

One of the SG-mates who'd never teamed with me before asked me in the sort of awestruck voice ... "What the hell is your powerset?!?"

One of the other SG-mates on the team, who knew already, simply said ... "That was No Get Hitsu."

I don't know what impressed them more ... the fact that I was able to pull off the feat or the fact that my build allows me to do that sort of thing from levels 35 and up as a matter of all-the-time regular routine just by turning on my secondary and leadership toggles ...

You have no recharge slotted in Practiced Brawler.
Are you SURE that's wise?

No no ... EASY MODE is getting around in Atlas/Galaxy and KR/Perez/Hollows and Steel/Skyway on a PB prior to level 6 and 14. Talk about stress free travel to the mission door.

Warshades are all taxibots for teammates at 10.

Thanks for coming out last night Tyrak. Glad you enjoyed the tour and learned a little bit about lighting and how to do 3 level rooms. Looking forward to seeing your screenshots.

Sidhe_Blade ... sorry you couldn't make it. Waited until 940p for you to show, and then we went inside to start the tour.

Look forward to seeing other people offering tours of their bases sometime soon!

And here I was going to say the best Mastermind for AV soloing was an SG Leader ...

For the record, I stand by nearly all of the recommendations made by Trickshooter in the OP. That doesn't however mean I have no ideas of my own to counter-propose with! ^_-

Also for the record ... Luminara ... YOU GO GIRL!
/em cheer

But first ... a note for Back Alley Brawler and the animation team:

BABs ... it is my sincere belief that NONE of the Archery, and NONE of the Trick Archery, animations should involve holding a nocked and drawn arrow for more than 0.8 seconds. Period. It is quite ridiculous to see our archers ... leisurely ... nock and draw an arrow ... and then WAIT ... standing there ... admiring the arrowhead for a full second or more ... vibrating in place, straining to hold back our awesome power we're about to unleash on the enemy.

Ideally, BABs, the amount of time spent on the nock-draw-release portion of the attack animations should be between 0.4 and 0.8 seconds. Specifically, I'm talking about the length of time that the notch of the arrow is in contact with the string of the bow. This does not include the portions of the animation concerning motion of the arrow to the bowstring, nor the portions of the animation concerning recovery to a "rest" position after loosing the arrow into flight. Part of the reason that the current animations *look* so ridiculous is that they animate in a way that implies that the archer is "choosing their target" *after* the player has already chosen which target to attack, which results in a cause-and-effect disconnect between the action on screen and the user interface commanding that action to take place.

Now ... on to Castle's area(s) of expertise ...

How much Defense Debuff Resistance do Ice/* Tankers get?
Oh yeah ... **NONE** ...

/em shrug

I've got a "planet" in my medical room. I put the rez rings on top of it (all the way up at the ceiling!). I then put the arcane inspiration storage item underneath the "planet" 1ft off the floor with a bonfire underneath it. In fact, you can kinda sorta see it in the overview pic of the Spring Knights base I posted this morning ...

A reminder (and a teaser) for anyone who wants to tour the Spring Knights base tomorrow. Tour begins at 930p Eastern on Tuesday, 3 Nov, and the assembly point to begin the tour is going to be the base portal in Galaxy City on Virtue.

And here's an overview screenshot of what the Spring Knights base looked like this morning:


For those who are curious, the base has completed buildout of all of its functional items. At this point, it's just a matter of collecting enough prestige to complete the decorations. The tech workshop remains on the "to do" list, as does completing the hangar in the power room ... and of course the big granddaddy of all decorative items, the 8x8 decorative room in the bottom left corner.

A cute trick with this is to "dangle" a ceiling dome from a string of hanging shoji lamps ... and then cap it with a floor dome you "lift" via your favorite surface item. Sandwich these two items together and you have a "planet" floating in the air.

Extra bonus points for putting an arcane floor seal into the "join" between the upper and lower halves so that your "planet" has a ring around the equator ...

That 2.625% damage buff over an infinite time span is a deceptive statistic. Not to say it's untrue (as far as these things go), just that it doesn't necessarily form an accurate representation of how it functions in actual gameplay. That's because the proc doesn't work as an always on buff ... instead it's a damage (and to hit) spiker.

During the time that the buff is in effect (for 5 seconds), I can unload essentially 3 attacks from my Nova which are all effectively critical hits (ala Scrapper) that'll affect every target I attack. So if the proc is in effect when I use my Nova cone or AoE attacks, that's not only a pretty serious uptick in damage for those attacks but also a serious potential time savings in being able to clear a horde. It can save me (and my team) the "expense" of 1-2 attacks against everything I've managed to hit ... which can ... but is not *guaranteed* to be ... can be a "game changer" in tight situations, especially on a team. No it's nothing you can "count on" happening at exactly the right time, but as you continue to play, IT WILL HAPPEN every so often.

The question is ... is that chance for profoundly increased effectiveness "worth it" to you over something more "obvious" and enduring such as a simple Flight IO? For a lot of people, the answer is simply going to be "NO" ... just because they look at the spreadsheet of statistical analysis and figure "it's not worth it" ... without having actually experienced the effect in actual gameplay.

Furthermore, I'd point out that it's possible to slot the Decimation proc into your Nova bolt power (fast recharge, low damage), rather than the blast power (high damage, slow recharge). With even moderate +Recharge, the Nova bolt attack quickly becomes a "quick shot" type of power, with a recharge speed of down around 0.75s or less on a reasonably quick animation. That gives you LOTS of opportunities to proc a buildup (from Decimation) ... which then makes the Gaussian proc in Nova seem a good bit more attractive, when you can get the synergies of the two procs working in tandem (albeit, most likely not at the same time).

With Decimation's proc in Nova bolt, and Gaussian's proc in Nova form ... your chances for a damage spike increase ... dramatically shall we say? It means that over any particular 10 second span of time, between the two procs there's something on the order of 4-5 chances to proc a build up. Without the Gaussian in Nova form, those chances to proc will drop to about 3-4 opportunities per 10 seconds (if only because you're not using the Nova bolt attack exclusively). 3-4 versus 4-5 chances to proc a buildup per 10 seconds is a non-trivial alteration in odds ... in my opinion ... hence why I slot both the Decimation (Nova bolt) and Gaussian (Nova form) procs in my builds (WS and PB).

As with so many things concerning Kheldians, taking a look at this issue of whether a Gaussian proc is "worth it" in Nova form requires seeing the whole picture of your entire build strategy ... and not just a narrow view of the Nova form power itself in compartmentalized isolation all by itself. Sure, the flight speed option is an "obvious result" choice, since you can see yourself flying faster ... but Kheldians aren't exactly "reliant" upon Nova form as their Travel power either. PBs can slot Swift for Fly on their way to Stamina, slot their human form flight power for Fly and be just as fast as Nova form in flight without expending any additional precious slots. WSs can get around faster using their Human form teleport, rather than flying around in Nova form. All of which means that the "pressure" to slot Nova form for Fly is really more a matter of convenience, rather than one of necessity.

So for me, the choice between a Fly IO and a Gaussian proc in Nova form is less a matter of *NEED* and more a matter of choice and preference. A choice between enhancing the power to make it more effective IN COMBAT ... the Gaussian proc ... or more effective at cruising BETWEEN COMBATS ... the Fly IO. It's a choice between a combat booster or a non-combat booster ... and everyone should decide for themselves which of those two things they want their Nova form to be "good at" when choosing what to put into a 1-slotted Nova form.

As always ... YMMV depending on your temperament as a player, your playstyle ... and your expectations for your Kheldian.

It's only a "waste of a slot" if there's something else you could USE in a single slot Nova form power that's more valuable to you. End Reduction and End Modification are most definitely wasted in that slot, if single slotting. The only End Mod set IO you might want to put there is the Performance Shifter proc ... maybe.

That leaves you with slotting Nova form with a simple common Fly IO ... or a Universal Travel proc, or a Stealth Proc ... or a To Hit Buff proc. Not exactly a whole lot of options.

The only problem I can see with the +Rech route is going to be your endurance usage. Yeah, it may sound great on paper ... but having your end bar continually bouncing to zero makes for a lousy tanker.

If you can't sustain your attacks with all that +Rech over a nigh indefinite period (think steamroller team or mothership raid) then you're a lot better off going with the soft capped DEF build.

Honoree cheats ... plain and simple.

You think Bots are stupid?
Try Ninjas.

You have not even BEGUN to stupid until you've dealt with Ninjas.

I find Nova Form to be extremely valuable on Hamidon Raids as well as against Praetorian AVs. In fact, if there's a Tanker on the team, I'm free to go Nova or Human as best fits both the team and the situation.

I did however only 6-slot 3 of the Nova attacks (quick ST, Cone and AoE) ... leaving the remaining attack (slow ST) with only the default slot (with merely a common 50 accuracy IO).

I prefer to use the Small Bookcase myself ... as you can see ...