Rigel_Kent

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Blasters are not known for healing ability (self or otherwise) without dipping into the Medicine pool. It can be safely assumed that since they never have gotten a self heal power built into a set before, that they were never intended to get one.

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First, assuming an AT will never learn a new trick is not a safe assumption. It's equally irrational to say that blasters will never have a mag 3 cone sleep, or psi damage type, or a damage cone in a secondary set, because they didn't have any of those at launch.

Second, I get the feeling blaster is the only AT that some would feel isn't allowed a new trick. Lucky us. All the built-up FUD from PvP stalkers must be gaining a foothold for us to be wringing our hands over the possibility of a 10% self-heal that requires an enemy and a to-hit check. Either that or we're getting confused with World of Warcraft mages again.

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It's more complicated than that. Very few critters have resistance to all damage types,

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But quite a few critters have 20% or more passive resistance to the damage type the critters themselves use. Which is the type that matters for damage debuff resistance.

Generally agree on your support of the Kinetics set, but I think you're underestimating the impact of damage debuff resistance in the PvE game. (Damage debuff resistance in PvP is almost assuredly broken, but hey, what isn't?)

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I would agree with this and add, changing the melee damage modifier on a Defender greatly without doing anything to the ranged damage modifier. Defenders have the hardest time getting into and surviving in melee range. Reward them if they get in there and try to mix it up.

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Even without a balance reason, do this for simplicity. Having damage modifiers the same on an AT is one fewer number to crunch.

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It is impossible for the scrapper inherent to be a duplicate of the stalker inherent, because they had it first.

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Distracting semantics. Scrapper and stalker inherents are highly similar regardless of which came first.

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That still bugs me that they gave the scrapper inherent to stalkers on TOP of their guaranteed critical from hide, and even made it so the stalker version works better.

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Goes to show how generic the scrapper inherent is, when it gets lifted outright for another AT.

It wouldn't even be so much adding an effect to PB as merely allowing it to be used while mezzed. (Active Defense too while we're at it.)

Though I also like the short duration buff idea for thematic reasons. Like the new Moment of Glory.

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TYou remember the MoGs because they are PITAs and take much more time and effort than they are worth.

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More time and effort than they would be worth even if they didn't reduce half their rewards just by MoGing.

Yes, last I checked, MoG's self-damage still counts 100% against your XP.

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I will be VERY surprised if a blaster version of Dark Blast is allowed to keep the self heal.

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I have to admit I'll be a little surprised too, if Life Drain keeps its 10% heal and keeps its 15 second recharge. What happened to Psi Blast has me and a lot of other blasters on edge.

But not very surprised. And certainly not so surprised that I won't advocate for a straight port. There's definitely no design rule that says blast sets can't have utility, and I don't think a self-heal is a particularly special form of utility. Heck, corruptors got to keep it.

Do expect Life Drain's PvP damage to be looked at, though. 58% higher damage than all 8 ticks of Gloom combined. It isn't raising any eyebrows now that only defenders corruptors and masterminds have it, but proliferation of sets to blasters has a way of generating lots of, um, "input" from PvPers.

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If Dark Blast is proliferated unchanged then Dark/Mental would quickly become one of the most survivable blaster combinations possible. Very possibly even to the point of being overpowered....

With some of the blaster build wizards on the forums here I expect it wouldn't be long before someone comes up with a nearly unkillable build.

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Survivable, yes. Unkillable... on an AE farm, yes. Overpowered, I'm not so sure. Debt prevention can only speed the XP rate by so much.

Re: Supernumiphone

Dark blast tohit debuffs in a straight port would be as follows. All stackable, enhanceable, power boostable, and subject to target resistances and level scaling.

Dark Blast: -5.25% for 6s
Gloom: -5.25% for 10s
Moonbeam: -5.25% for 10s
Dark Pit: no tohit debuff
Tenebrous Tentacles: -5.25% for 8s
Night Fall: -5.25% for 10s
Torrent: -5.25% for 10s
Life Drain: -5.25% for 10s
Blackstar: -35% for 20s

So, yes, there's a little something to play with here, especially for Dark/EM with, ahem, "creative" Power Boost slotting, cough cough. Though even with "creative" Power Boost slotting, Dark blasters would have tohit debuff numbers almost exactly the same as /Dark defenders. Few defenders go that route, so I'm sure cone damage and binary effects (stun/immob/knock) will still be the main draws of the set for blasters as well.

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The +def provided by Cloaking Device is negligible

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Ah, much like the heal provided by Life Drain then.

I don't like the scrapper inherent. It's just so dull and uninteresting, even without being a flimsy duplicate of the stalker inherent. 5% or 10% crit chances sound like something that should be part of the powers themselves, because they sure as heck aren't archetype defining. But I don't know what the alternatives would be. People are happy enough with scrappers that not a lot of ideas are out there.

Also, please no "you can't fix A because B is more broken." That kind of talk gets nothing fixed.

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If HOs are so pointless, how do you explain the going prices for some of them on the markets ?

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-looks at HO prices-
-looks at purple prices-

I'm not sure you're making the point you're wanting to make.

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Life Drain, being a self heal, is a little more problematic. Blasters are probably not going to ever get a self heal, but I've been wrong before. If slotted with an Accurate Healing set it could become a significant heal and I just don't see them allowing blasters to have it.

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Since when are blasters to be denied a power just because it has a defensive component? Just look at Cloaking Device -- defense toggle in a blaster set. Besides, 51% of Aid Self's heal value isn't something I'd describe as "a significant heal." Neither would the majority of */Dark defenders who routinely skip the power. If you're really that hot to get 10 to 20% of your life back, do what the */Dark defenders do. Pop a Respite.

I only see one balance issue with proliferating Dark Blast unchanged. It's one of only two Dark Blast issues mentioned in the defender issues thread -- Night Fall should have TT's lower end cost, TT should have Night Fall's higher end cost, for all AT's.

Half the forum thinks Dark Pit is too overpowered to be a blaster primary, therefore needs to be replaced.

Half the forum thinks Dark Pit is too underpowered to be a blaster primary, therefore needs to be replaced.

In reality, blasters get the best deal with a direct port of the set. Any tweaks -- especially the popular but utterly drab suggestion to add Aim and Dark Obliteration -- and we lose a chance at a unique niche set in favor of yet another ho-hum damage set little different from the ones we have already. Seriously, if all you want is a black Aim and a black Fire Ball, you're already getting it with Power Spectrum.

Short version: Better to have a choice between very different sets than to have a non-choice between identically functioning sets.

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I buff, heal, and control on my Fire/Kin. ... Though I occasionally feel as if I'm in the minority at this point. :/

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Now what gives you that idea?

Re: Ben_Arizona
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However, you are likely to face the expectation/assumption that you are a farmer.

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Taking, slotting, and using Increase Density will get rid of that assumption in no time. Increase Density says, loud and clear, "I do just fine without a granite tanker, and so do you."

Well, that, and "lolsmashing."

If the root+stun+hold protection+resistance isn't justification enough to take it, think of the 8 mag knockback protection. If the 8 mag knockback protection isn't enough, think of the 29% smashing and energy damage resistance (at the ED cap). If the the 29% smashing and energy damage resistance still isn't enough, think of the 29% smashing and energy damage debuff resistance. A lot of people don't know about that -- Kinetic's own little anti-Kinetic power to help your teammates deal with Red Ink Men/Swift Steels, Force/Agony Mages, Steel Strongmen/Dark Ring Mistresses/Dark Servants, and any other damage debuffers you might run across in non-farm AE missions.

Making it a 100% mag 2 stun wouldn't be a terribad idea, though I'd prefer seeing it as a cone for consistency with Sands of Mu and Shadow Maul.

Unique is good. Some of the unique suggestions for Vigilance I've seen have been smashing the cottage rule and making it inspiration related. My suggestion: defender insps are PBAoE buffs. Another suggestion I've seen: defenders get a copy of the buff whenever a nearby teammate pops an insp.

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Despite my love of the idea, I am 99.9998% sure we are never going to see them add something to the game where merely being near teammates debuffs your damage.

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Yeah. Conditional buffs are equivalent to conditional debuffs, under the opposite conditions. Also, conditional buffs are getting really overdone, especially ones that have that whiff of "encouraged (forced) teaming" about them.

Vigilance, for example.

Just had an idea. If the client could check a simple TXT file in the City of Heroes directory and import that list into the ignorelist, that might spur "player developers" to devise stronger anti-spam measures. Likely a simple utility to periodically update the TXT file from trusted blacklist(s) posted on the web, so known spammers get blocked even before players have to log in. Even at its simplest, friends could trade their blacklists with each other.

I semi-like it on a superspeeder concept controller who isn't taking an APP for concept reasons. 100% crits from Containment plus lack of better options makes the power, hmm, tolerable. Barely.

Still, I hope one extreme corner case doesn't dull the point here. Flurry needs help.

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We'd better damn have Radiation Assault coming down the line as well.

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Radiation Assault for doms would be lovely.

Radiation Manipulation for blasters -- maybe not so much. I'd credit the lack of a new Radiation Manipulation for blasters as the reason Radiation Blast is likely to retain Irradiate, Electron Haze, and Cosmic Burst, rather than having some or all of them get borrowed to fill out a secondary.

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Keep in mind that a Corruptor's damage base is only 0.75, compared to a Defender's 0.65. You could raise the damage base to 0.70, but if you raised it to 0.75, Defenders would do the same damage as Corruptors, and would have greater buffs besides.

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I doubt many would object to corruptors getting a small damage bump as well. In my view, it's the controller-defender comparison that's really problematic, since one of the two ATs is clearly a high performer -- not so much the defender-corruptor one, where both ATs are kind of meh.

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Freedom, 8:30 PM Eastern 7/16/09 (because it's a largish sample size; N=906.)

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Heads up to two possible sources of bias: 1) AT distributions may vary between peak hours and off-peak hours, and 2) AT distributions may vary between high population and low population servers.

One statistic that jumps out at me immediately: the median level for controllers in your sample. The median level for defenders looks about 32, scrappers blasters and tankers together in about the 36-39 range, and the median level for controllers is probably at least 45, and may even be 50 outright, if level 50 controllers outnumber all under-50 controllers, a significant possibility. (Note to newbie statisticians: the median is the number at which half the samples are below and half the samples are above... for example, the median of 10 20 30 40 50 50 50 is 40; the median of 10 20 30 40 50 50 50 50 50 is 50.)

My theory to explain the two outliers: controllers are extremely popular for level 50 content, and defenders level 12% slower than everyone?

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what damage?!"

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In I5, there was lots of it, you just had to slot for it.

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Right, but the patch note lists off a whole bunch of powers that do little or no damage so...

Their sarcasm has unfortunately blurred their points.

One was trying to say defenders aren't especially vulnerable to mez. One was trying to say they are.

Re: Miladys
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Controller AoE Holds, Disorients and Sleeps (and a few others like Quicksand and Ice Slick) recharge times have been increased and duration reduced, to balance the new increased damage

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Even after all these years, this patch note still makes me want to say "AoE holds, disorients, sleeps, quicksand, ice slick... what damage?!"

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How about a change to the inherent where the more teammates you have, the better the primary performs, and the less teammates you have the better the secondary performs?

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In some suggestion types of forum threads, I pooh-pooh other people's ideas just because I like my own idea better. With Vigilance, everyone's ideas sound great to me, even better than the last. Says a lot about Vigilance doesn't it?

Re: Miladys
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While the Defender as a whole may not be extinct I would say that GR will definitely put them on the endangered species list.

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They're not already?

I see GR as being a bigger problem for Tankers than Defenders. Defenders have the nostalgia crowd plus the "need healer" crowd that Corruptors won't touch. With Tankers, though, I think it's just the nostalgia crowd -- I'm not sure the AE permanewbies will "need tanker" since Brutes often do just as well. (Though I do doubt AE permanewbies will figure out how to use masterminds for tanking, that's some good news for tankers. )

Two words: Crossbows please!