Reppu

Considering said heal is...

1) Fairly unsubstantial

and

2) On a massive 25 (or 35?) second cooldown...

It won't.

The core problem will be the healing. Even at those large resistance numbers, they will take continuous damage, and need the healing to keep them going. Sonic sacrifices the healing for... nothing worthwhile.

That said, yes. The game is balanced around SOs. In an SO game, Time is still a playable set. Although in the SO game, it's massive cooldown on one of it's two main sources of mitigation, Temporal Mending, becomes GLARINGLY obvious. The set, in the SO world, is a lot weaker. This is no surprise mind you. Very few sets do not get much better with IOs.

That said? I did some SO testing with Time, and it didn't take long for me to go "Ugh, Temporal Mending's cooldown is painful".

I personally think it should be put to 16 seconds. Twice as much as the other AoE heals, considering over time, Temporal Mending roughly breaks even with two applications of an AoE heal. This is probably the only power I have any real problem with. 18 seconds just feels too /long/.

That said, it's a good set, I personally like it. I'll personally play! Just not on a Mastermind. The Mastermind Creed is that "If something goes wrong, it's going wrong very quickly.". A lot of being a good mastermind is split-second responses and immediate solutions. Time's delayed nature, be that as it's part of the concept, is detrimental to this AT.

But, yes. I do enjoy the set. It's fun to play, although the sound effects are "Egh". Too much Sonic Screwdriver, not enough clocks.

Pretty much as noted above. There's no synergy at all, Time just helps the fact that Gravity is an extremely underwhelming and, honestly, underpowered set.

I was hoping it would be looked at for i21, but alas.

If you want to roll it as a concept, by all means. But it (and Mind) are arguably the weakest of the Controller primaries.

If the Jounin didn't have that stupid poison dart, they'd be way, way better. As it stands, Ninjas have some of the weakest self-protection (Defense/Resistance/Etc) of all the pets, which is hysterical seeing as they're the only "True Melee" pets in the game.

Sigh.

Forcefield is, if nothing else, boring. Not a bad set, just boring.

Everyone, EVERYONE, claims to be a master of their respective AT. The problem is, you stated this as well as admitting you had very, very little time to test. If you were as experienced as you claimed, you would KNOW that a few minutes is NOT enough to test a Mastermind set and all of it's synergies. THIS is why I questioned you, or rather called you out on it.

Regardless, I may have been somewhat dismissive of you, but I still /responded to everything you said/. You didn't do the same, so don't call me out and then do what you claimed I did, but I actually didn't do ;P

I'd question your experience, by merit of Ninjas being the biggest micro-heavy petset of the lot. If you're capable of juggling the Jounin's needing proper set up, the positioning of the Oni, and leashing the Genins, while also able to constantly use all of Time's powers fully? I salute your micro-management prowess.

And going by the fact you said you had very little time to test it... ahem. Moving on...

The Heal over Time is hardly "Perfect". It's left me wanting when any pets take damage with out innate Resistances. And since Ninjas are one of the two pets with out any Resistance...

The 300% Regen you mentioned is also pretty lackluster for pets, their base HP is too horrible to make it worthwhile. For allies, it's great! No doubt about that.

I think it falls down to this; Time has the same problem a lot of MM secondaries have, and that it offers no Resistance in any shape or form, and it's heal is a weaker burst with a hefty cooldown. Resistance means far more to a pet than Defense does, although having both is key. But 90% Resistance beats 45% Defense, period.

Considering I had Bots being one-shot'd during my test runs, it's painful. Sure, you can re-summon, but that's not the point here. I also never claimed Time was "Bottom of the Barrel", but it definitely left me wanting.

I'll sum it up like this; Nobody cares how well it does farming, because Masterminds can farm with any secondary. So, let's focus on teaming.

/Dark offers the most important Resistance in the game right now, being Energy. It offers a better -To Hit/-DMG debuff, a better -DEF/-RES Debuff, a superior heal, some defense, an amazing secondary pet, a comparable hold, and another -To Hit debuff.

/Traps offers one of the best powers in the game, Caltrops. That aside, it has one of the best -Regen powers in the game, a good -To Hit debuff, Triage Beacon is RETARDED if you get a Panacea Proc, FFG is one of the best Mastermind powers in the game, PERIOD, Acid Mortar is the superior -Res/-Def power, even if it is "Random", it's able to reliably proc A.Heel so GG, and Web Grenade is a surprisingly amount of -Recharge and Slow if that's your thing. Traps also has skippable powers so you have a LOT more freedom.

I shouldn't have to Describe /Thermal. Thermal's freaking amazing. I learned how amazing it was by my own testing, and wow. Resistance and Healing is one of the best, if not the BEST, way to keep Pets alive and kicking. Combined with having some of the most devastating debuffs in the game? Thermal won me over through blood and tears.


Now, Time isn't a bad set. By all means it's not. But the PBAoE Heal + HoT is very weak on Masterminds. It can get the job done, but it won't do it well with out the buff on someone. And sadly that buff is a little gimped on a Pet. Sucks, but it's true. Still, I like the Heal. I just know it's weak on Masterminds.

The application of Time Crawl is hard to upkeep with normal skill levels of micromanagement. It's possible, mind you. It's also not worth bothering with on teams unless there's a single difficult target you can make your *****. And since Time uses the few debuffs heavily resisted by AVs... >_>

Slowed Response is good for what it is. No complaints that aren't the same as Melt Armor's.

Time's Juncture is neutered on Masterminds, to say the least. It's not a bad power still, but damn is it weakened.

Temporal Selection makes me cry because I know it would be better on another AT, but other than that? Amazing buff. No complaints. Wish the cooldown was shorter, of course.

The Hold is a standard hold that can be pretty spiffy. Hooray.

Farsight annoys me because all it is is +Defense and nothing more. Well, and a ToHit buff but that's not what I mean. FFG is so amazing because of it's Mez Protection. The PbAoE +Defense Auras are amazing due to their +Resistance numbers. Farsight gets you and your pets closer to the softcap, but Resistance is the /key/ here. Especially with such a weaker burst heal. Farsight is a /good/ power, but it personally pisses me off.

Distortion Field is amazing when soloing, but it's sort of lackluster in teams. You can throw it down but everything it WOULD hold is dead within five seconds of engagement anyway. RNG might help hold a Boss, but eh. I like it, but I know it's a gimmicky power.

Chrono Shift? I wish it dropped the damn HoT and instead went a full-duration +Regen/Recovery buff. Otherwise I look at it as purely a +50% Recharge buff with a little +Endurance on it and an ignorable HoT. Saving it as an "Oh ****" Button is pointless because +50% Recharge is MASSIVE and would help KILL THINGS far more than the paltry HoT would help SAVE things.



All this aside, Time is a good set. Middle of the road, but it's not superior to Traps, Dark, or Thermal. I KNOW I will see it played, I KNOW I will see it played badly because people already suck at micromanaging MMs and Time promotes even WORST MM micromanaging.

I hate Time for that ;P

Bottom of the barrel would be mercenaries, not Ninjas! That aside, I think the numbers are a little too low for /Masterminds/. Due to the hybrid nature of the set, it had to have lower numbers than the specialized ones. It makes sense.

But I feel the differences on an MM.

Saying Fire Blast is a good combo is stating the obvious. It's a freakishly overpowered set!

That aside, people saying that Time Manipulation is "Godly" with incarnate abilities should stop there. We're trying to focus on the set's ability to stand on it's own two feet.

No, no. Willpower, with IOs, is probably the single strongest defensive set in the game, with very few holes to speak of. It might start off as a "Jack of all Trades", but it quickly becomes a "Master of All". Except bonus damage, but eh.

Time Manipulation is honestly what Trick Arrow WANTED to be, but failed. Well, not quite. Time Manipulation technically has no damage power.

I posted my opinions on the Mastermind Forum, but I'll sum them up here;

It's a very busy set. It robs attention of the complimenting set, be it Primary or Secondary. The Endurance Costs for Masterminds are brutal with out Incarnate Support, which always screams to me as a Bad Set.

It plays like a Hybrid Set. It has no real strengths or weaknesses, as expected of one. It's a good farmer and has good AV merit, but doesn't specialize in either.

I don't think it will steal Trap's title of Best MM Secondary for AV and Teaming Shenanigans, but it's got it's merit. Although people calling it the "New OP for Masterminds" are freaking stupid. The greatly nerfed, but deserved, Time's Juncture is to note for the whole "You should be in Melee with this set!"

Time's Juncture is a wide enough PBAoE to catch many enemies, but enemies outside of it, if you were foolishly relying on it for a pseudo soft cap, are going to make your life a bit agonizing. That aside, for Masterminds? The reduced numbers and Mastermind Increased Endurance Costs make it a good addition to the Secondaries list, but it probably won't trump any of the Big Three (Thermal, Dark, Traps).

Mastermind sets want debuffs, and stacking defensive powers, be it healing, resistance, or defense. Time Manipulation has all of these, but not in the high numbers Masterminds look for. It's not a bad set, however. I might end up playing it, but Masterminds need so much micromanaging as it is, it's hard to really give Time Manipulation the attention it craves.


PS: Beam Rifle/Time Manipulation is going to be the funniest FoTM since Dual Pistols/Mental Manipulation. Both sets require so much attention and focus to them that you're not utilizing their special traits if you go with both. Time needs a set that doesn't need heavy amounts of focus to do it's job. And anyone who does DP/Time is probably the same type who thought DP/Mental had any true synergy. DP isn't a "Melee Set", because I'm sorry to the Defenders who think so? One PBAoE does not make a melee set.

Ho Hum~

Okay, been doing it again. I'm more or less ignoring anything Incarnate-esque besides the Alpha Slot. I'm a firm believer in "If a set needs incarnate crap to be viable, it's probably bad. Or Dark Armor, which is amazing."

Also because I don't feel like farming Trials all night. Yet.

Anywho, the current build is decent. Some jerkfaces are buying Panacea's like jerks, or buying out popular recipes and putting them up for max Influence. Yep. Gotta love the Beta Trolls. But I'd say it's definitely a multi-billion build none the less.

I'll give Time one thing? Distortion Field is amazing in farming, but the lack of -Res Patch doesn't make me happy. Sure it has a PBAoE -Res/-DEF debuff but it's targeted, which is rough in farming.

Temporal Mending isn't much different from any other AoE heal, when IO'd to hell and the pets soft capped to defense. I would say it'd probably be amazing on pets with high levels of Resistance, but Time Manipulation isn't a +RES set, so that's out. All it really is, in testing, is an AoE heal with a huge cooldown for little benefit.

Sure, it's a bit stronger with the buff, but eh. I wasn't /impressed/. Heck, the buff slotted with +Healing is sexy all on it's own. Practically +300% Regen is nice.

Time Crawl is a lot more tedious than you may think. While soloing en-masse, you might toss it on a boss and then just let the AoE slaughter of your pets begin? Buuuuut yeah. You're going to forget about it generally in AoE battles, which is where Masterminds tend to enjoy.

AV's? Well sure, you should be firing it off whenever needed. But... it's a bit of an endurance nommer.

I think my biggest issue with Time Manipulation is that it uses the Mastermind Endurance Coefficient, which is really brutal with a twitchy set. I bottom out extremely quickly, considering how toggle-heavy MMs are. I might need to consider Cardiac over Spirituality in this scenario. Probably, yes. Time Manipulation is pretty endurance heavy.

Do note I refuse to acknowledge Ageless, because nobody gets that excuse.

... 'cept Dark Armor.

I don't know /what to say/ with this set for Masterminds specifically. It's a Hybrid Set. It does a bit of anything but nothing amazingly. I could see it being a good farming set, probably not the /best/. I don't think it'll knock Traps off it's throne, even with a PBAoE heal.

I think it's a compliment to the arsenal. I see people trying it out, obviously, when it hits live. I mean, Chrono Shift is a nice +50% Recharge, but it needs a total +300% Recharge to be perma.

This is not cheap to do individually, as that suggests a total of 150% Global Recharge, as you count Chrono Shift's 50%. Hasten would be 70%. So you'd need another 80% of Global Recharge.

Masterminds are probably the hardest AT to fit set bonus +Recharge in. 7.5% x 5 Luck of the Gambler noted, being 37.5%. So another 42.5%. (Farsight, Combat Jumping or Hover, Maneuvers, Weave, Vengeance or A/PPP Shield.)

We'll start with the Time Manipulation set itself, and we're going to ignore Purples for now.

Temporal Mending = Doctored Wounds +5%
Time's Juncture = Dark Watcher's Despair +5%
Temporal Selection = Doctored Wounds +5%
Distortion Field = Basilisk's Gaze +7.5%
Chrono Shift = Doctored Wounds +5%
Time Stop = Basilisk's Gaze +7.5%

We'll stop here, for 35% of our 42.5% needed.

You could slot Tactics with Adjusted Targeting, granting another 5% but sacrificing Gaussians. At this point, you need 2.5% to Perma.

Taking a personal attack and slotting it with Decimation, or anything of that like. This would do it.

Now, with all this, you're going to sacrifice anything but POSSIBLY a S/L Soft Cap. MAYBE. I personally do not like relying on Prot Bot shields for an S/L Cap, because that means I couldn't do this with any other MM set.

Is it worth it for Perma Chrono Shift? Well, it gets you Perma Hasten as well... but is Time Manipulation a recharge hungry set? And what about Chrono Shift's Heal and Endurance boosts?

They're sadly not something you should keep the power on cooldown for. The +Recharge is far more substantial of a boon. By far.

If you go with a Patron or Aux Shield, you can hit safely huddle the soft cap. Although i know many Masterminds who prefer a +Resistance shield. That said, with Bots at least, you can sit at your 65%+ S/L Resistance and 45%ish to your varying defenses with the Bot Shield.

Yes, Time's Juncture is effective +Defense due to it's -ToHit, but it doesn't do squat to ranged targets and AVs will shrug the -ToHit off decently.



So, let's finalize this.

1) Is it better than Bots/Traps? No, I don't think so. Traps has the benefit of a few extra bodies to help you out, isn't as endurance draining, and it's Mez Protection helps prevent you from any number of accidents. Caltrops is still godly as all sin. Traps is superior against AVs, no questions asked. Superior -Res/Defense (Acid Mortar's constant check against it and ability to proc Interface, I think?), and Time Crawl/Time Stop aren't touching Poison Trap's OBLITERATION of -Regen. While Chrono Shift is probably the major shining light here, which I won't deny is a good +50% Recharge power. Oh, and I guess it heals. For Farming, I'll willingly compare Caltrops to Distortion Field. Why? You'd know how amazing Caltrops is at mitigation if you've used it before. And Poison Trap, again, does the same job as Distortion Field.

And, to note on all this? Traps effects persist a LOT longer in most cases, thusly using far less Endurance over time, while Time Manipulation constantly reapplies. This is part of that Endurance issue i mentioned before.


As it is, Time is a set that needs a lot of Recharge, and is thusly an IO Baby. A lot of it's powers seem to acknowledge the fact Chrono Shift is a +50% Recharge Power, but that alone isn't enough.

At the end of the day, is /Time a bad set? No. But is it the new OP? Goodness no.

/Dark, /Traps/, and /Thermal all seem superior to me still. Especially the last two.



Phew.

Yes. The current version of TM is pretty much what I said it was; it's not going to be all that good on MMs.

The heal's HoT component, to try to justify it's recharge, is about as weak as expected - it's a 137 up-front heal with a 36.75 HoT enhanced. While it will out-heal a standard PBAoE heal? This is over time, which is "Hrm".

Time's Juncture is definitely weakened, no doubt about it. It also enforces Melee MM Play, which is a bit of a tricky thing as it is. It's definitely not a bad power, but it'll keep you busy if you want the full debuffs applied.

All together, it's not a /bad/ set. But it's extremely active, and people who say Masterminds can afford to focus on it because they don't need to pay attention to their Primary, are bad masterminds. We're the most micro-managed AT in the game, with even a second of dropping our attention on our surroundings will lead to a sudden pet death and a massive damage loss.

Maybe I micromanage too hard? Or maybe not enough? If nothing else, Time will keep you busy.


TL;DR Final Thoughts - There's nothing really 'new' here. It's a hybrid set, something that Trick Arrow tried and failed to do. It's not an amazing set, it's a 'good' set. It's not exactly tuned to the Mastermind, however. If you like the swirly animations, go for it. But my personal verdict for now is "It's sub-par on MMs."

... Yeah. Not really liking those numbers in the least. And those are the /Defender/ numbers.

It looks like it'll be a lot weaker on the other three respective ATs, not to mention the sheer focus it wants. However, Masterminds are able to greatly benefit from the PbAoE Power.

... Ninja/Time. Hm.

Also, Re: Temporal Mending? It may heal more over time than the other PBAoE heals? But it also has a significantly larger cooldown. A whole 10 seconds more. This is pretty major. Dunno how it would compare in a heavy IO world, but it's worth noting 8 vs. 18.

Well, we'll find out for sure! but if it has a +Defense AoE Power, it'll work best with Bots or Thugs.

I guess Bots/Time is the popular suggestion, eh?

If a secondary isn't self-sufficient, it's not a very /good/ secondary. This question was "Work well". I don't think it will work /well/. It will /work/, but not /well/.

Again, just going by the labels, it looks to be a strictly inferior Dark Miasma with two (four) gimmick powers that aren't influential to the MM AT. It might be better for Controllers/Defenders/Corruptors, mind.

Also, healing, from the MM, is one of the worst things to bank a set on. MM's horrible HP nase means their heals are pretty insignificant. But, this could be remedied depending on the numbers of Farsight and Time's Juncture.

... But they have Kinetics.

We can't say exactly how Farsight works, really. It's too soon to assume it's some AoE +Defense to all types or positionals buff. I mean, it could be a clone of Mind Link, but that would be pretty lame, since it seems the set has a few 'clone' powers so far.

As for Time's Juncture, I suppose that depends on how fierce it is. There's one thing, however, that makes me go "Hrm" about all this...

... Wouldn't this all just add up to being a worse Dark Miasma, much like Sonic is a worse Thermal, for MMs?

If we compare this to Dark Miasma, which it's starting to look like it's an off-shoot of... you're going to have a few clone powers of Dark Miasma, comboed with, at a glance, two or so powers that don't benefit your pets. Unlike Dark Miasma, where the whole set is a giant batch of delicious synergy.

With the assumption of icons, I'll say what I feel - Time Manipulation will be a lackluster Dark Miasma, with the current guesses. Will it be playable? Sure, even Poison is 'playable' right now. Will it o be optimized? Not in the least.

Honestly? No. It doesn't seem to offer anything to the pets, which is an issue. It does have an AoE heal, apparently, but it has nothing to stack with it. Heals themselves are weak with out further, layered, defenses.

I don't see Time Manipulation, at this first glance, performing with Masterminds.

Musculature isn't as substantial on MMs as it is is others, due to the 'low' base numbers of the pets. It'll add damage, but not significantly.

If you find yourself having endurance conflicts, Cardiac is a good route. The +Resistance on it is nice, too.

Spirituality goes a long way in negating a lot of the +Recharge needed for PermaHasten. Ultimate, Spirituality or Cardiac is the way to go.

As for Destiny, Clarion is nice to keep yourself un-mezzed, but a Light Purple is generally a good way to avoid being CC'd. Ageless isn't too great on MMs due to the lack of functionality it has for the pets, but it's a personal favorite of mine. As Dark Miasma, you don't really need Destiny's AoE Heal. I'd suggest Barrier for you. A bit of extra +Def and +Res can go a long way.

Finally, Lore? Pick whatever fits your character concept. No Lore pets are significantly superior to any other.