Smiling_Joe

I've been mulling resistance sets over since reading this. Since Scrappers have a hit point cap that's 33% higher than Stalkers - and given that the two resistance sets they share give the same amount of mitigation (25%) per toggle, how much good would it do to give the resistance toggles in DA and EleA 33% more resistance to compensate? This would mean that the resistance toggles for each would provide right at 30% resistance.

Would that be something that would make at least a little bit of difference?

Now the resistance sets in question have to make up a good portion of their mitigation through their respective heals, so if the above isn't enough then perhaps a proportionate recharge bonus could be given to the heals. My original thought was, of course, 33%, but a 20 second recharge on Dark Regeneration seemed a bit too much while 80.4 seconds for Energize brings it below that of Reconstruction, so I won't even speculate on how much recharge - if any - could be given to these two powers and still be balanced.

EDIT - I'm an idiot. Since reducing the recharge seems so out of whack to me, what about increasing the heals by 15% - possibly in combination with a slightly reduced recharge? Eh. That's not completely thought through, but I'll toss it in the mix anyway.

The crux of the suggestion therefore is just the increase to resistance gained from the toggles.

Not really a suggestion that affects stalkers as a whole so much as attempts to at least partially bridge the chasm between stalker secondaries.

That's why you don't run in first and open with AS. You're much better off to let the brute or the mastermind run in and take the aggro and then AS a target that's already taunted. Placating that or another target that's already pounding on the higher hp meatbags is safe then, too.

Too many stalkers I've teamed with seem to think that because they can run in first without aggroing the spawn, that they should run in first.

Not directing that at you, Bright - just making an observation from what you said of what many stalkers I've seen tend to do on teams.

I'll 'fess up - I've slipped and fallen into that trap myself on occasion.

None of the changes for brutes directly endangered other members of the team. The suggested change for stalkers I was addressing - namely, the chance for random aoe placates - does endanger the team, and if you're going to measure performance based on other archetypes, then it's probably a good idea not to ask for changes that are directly detrimental in that regard.

You likely haven't seen a stalker's placate in the middle of a battle directly kill another team mate very often because stalkers can currently control who and when they placate. The first and only time I incorrectly used placate on a team resulted in a squishy being killed by my intended victim, and I never used it wrong again. Giving stalkers a random aoe placate every time they crit (I believe that was the suggestion) is taking that control away.

I'm all for suggestions that improve a stalker's performance (although like Jibikao I'm not completely convinced much - if anything - needs to be done), so long as they don't negatively affect the team dynamic. My main point was with regard to that one suggestion and the perceived attitude that its downsides didn't matter because we're talking about individual performance.

If that was my misperception I apologize, but I still maintain that - as any changes made do not happen in a vacuum - it would be wise to suggest them in a broader context than individual performance.

You can't have your cake and eat it too. You can't use the metric of stalkers not doing enough damage when compared with scrappers and brutes and then say you're mainly interested in the buff for soloing. If you're going to rationalize a buff based on comparisons of a stalker's performance with other archetypes, then you're going to have to accept that any buff you may or may not get will have to take those archetypes into consideration in a teamed environment.

OTOH, what if hidden status were given the Fiery Embrace treatment? If a stalker crits from hide, then bonus damage of a thematic type (say, psionic or negative energy) is also granted to the attack. Instead of a DoT like Fiery Embrace's burning, it would be burst. This would tie in any damage buffs to what a stalker's main job is: to assassinate from hiding.

However, it may not be possible to tie the bonus damage to hidden status specifically (verses an active Hide toggle with hidden status broken) in the same way as Fiery Embrace. In that case, it could be done through the assassin strike's fear effect. If I remember correctly, this is nothing more than a pbaoe tohit debuff power with a chance to fear that is given to the victim of the AS. Add a self-affecting burst of damage to that power, essentially giving bonus damage in a less resisted form to an AS delivered from hide.

The point could be made that the "power" isn't granted to the victim if he/she dies, but then again, who cares about extra damage not being dealt to a corpse? The argument could be made that this is just a fancy way to give a damage buff that could just as easily be attained by a simple damage modifier increase, but I'd point out two things: 1) this suggestion makes a bigger damage buff more likely, since it is balanced by being tied to hidden status and Assassin Strike, and 2) this suggestion is easier to combine with other suggestions (like the one to remove the dead time from assassin strike).

The idea is to make stalkers more desirable on teams. Shedding aggro like water off a duck's back is okay, provided you're not sending that aggro over to your teamed squishies.

The quickest way stalkers get booted from teams is by abandoning their team in the name of "scouting." But only SLIGHTLY LESS OFFENSIVE are the stalkers who get teammates killed through consistently poor use of placate in big fights. Giving it an AoE -taunt effect WITH THE INTENTION of sending that aggro to the rest of your team is just asking to have stalkers shunned in the future.

It's serum.

Marco!



...........................Polo!

This.

And, for that matter: in lieu of raising the damage/damage buff modifier, why not make crit damage unresisted for every stalker attack?

Why? This lets stalkers focus on what stalkers were made for: superior damage through criticals. The damage is less than scrappers on average when scrapping solo, and could actually (possibly only in my mind - numbers are my nemesis) out-damage scrappers on the criticals. It would make stalkers do vastly more damage on teams (especially with the critical radius expanded) and would give them the ability to score unresisted damage after the placate on their second target. (which, in my case, is frequently a second longbow warden).

Stalkers do not need help in the survivability department.

With large spawns, you can hit the 10 target maximum just as easily from the edge of the spawn just as easily as from the middle. With small ones, it really doesn't matter whether you scatter them or not - there's not enough incoming damage to merit that kind of crowd control.

And if you're going to say it's a downside that its aoe component - if used as I've described - is only as effective as a cone, then I get to point out that it's a benefit that - because it's pbaoe - I don't have to have a target to set it off.

If, for example I want my nove to hit a spawn from the one side or another with its aoe for a little crowd control, I have to have a target selected. If I pre-select the target and then make my move, there's a good chance that target will move also, taking control of where my attack lands from me. If I wait until I'm in position to select a target, I have to either scan the spawn for an optimum target (thus wasting time when every second counts) or just hit tab and hope it's the one I want.

With Solar Flare I don't even have to be looking at the spawn to know where my attack will land. I am the attack, and this gives me greater control of the situation.

The point's been made before that the damage happens before the knockback. Even with knockdown, no one on your team is going to wait for the mobs to be on their collective backside before firing off their attacks and aoe holds. Regardless of whether you're doing kb or kd, those attacks and holds will hit. Even if the mobs are in the air and flying, they'll still be in range of all those attacks and holds when they hit, because most team members let their alpha attacks go at roughly the same time.

Now, I'll grant you that your luminous detonation would be a far more effective follow-up if the mobs were knocked down, but with the anemic damage of the human form blasts, I'll wager that the difference in damage between a kd and a kb scenario would be negligible.



And all the downsides you brought up were generic KB ones too, with the exception of:

-Throw foes away from you where they can lose aggro and go after squishy teammates.[/quote]

Which - ignoring the fact that you generated no taunt-based aggro to lose with a human form pb attack - is a valid point.

I assume by this you mean that flying forms of kb powers can be used from directly above to knock mobs into the ground, thus needing no verticle environment to knock them against, as you would with Solar Flare. A couple of points:

Just because a kb power can be used from the air doesn't mean it always is. We can't assume everyone who takes kb powers will take - and use - fly. PB's get fly as an inherent, but because the human form's heavy hitters are melee attacks, you'll see very few people toggling fly before hitting dawn strike or photon seekers.

Also, your statement implies that scenery is rare. With the exception of that same nature preserve map that so many missions take place on (and sometimes it's on fire for extra fun) and a couple croatoa maps, there's a wall or a building or something any which way you turn in the vast majority of missions. No power is used in a vaccum. Why wouldn't you use scenery to your advantage? Tanks and blasters corner pull with taunts and snipes, but no one disparages those powers because they require scenery.



And bad players can turn any power - kd, kb, face-melting or otherwise - into a liability. There are always going to be bad players who don't know how to properly utilize an attack and thus cause trouble.

As I said above, even in the center of a spawn you can only hit a maximum of ten mobs. In spawns of ten mobs and below, the minions will die in the alpha anyway, and so there's no need to worry about kb. In larger spawns, you'll have no problem at all hitting that maximum from the fringes of the spawn so long as you're in melee range when you do fire it off.

The other downsides you mentioned are the same downsides that are the same general downsides to kb that get talked about ad nauseum accross archetypes and powersets.

Keep bringing them up, though. It's discussions like these that help turn bad players into good players.

I think the point Dechs is trying to drive home is that if you're hitting Solar Flare in the center of a mob and having them fly in all directions you're doing it wrong. You don't have to be in the middle of a mob to be in melee range. Use Solar Flare from the edge of the mob, preferably on the edge opposite a wall or corner, or the edge nearest the squishies (thus knocking the mobs away from the squishies). Knockback - like every other effect in the game - takes practice to use correctly.

Just because you can survive a mob doesn't mean you can tank. Your attacks have no taunt effect, and unless you took - AND SLOTTED - one of the taunts in the presence pool, you're not holding aggro AT ALL. And if you did take the presence pool, you're a poor substitute for a tank, due to the crappiness of those taunts and the lack of a taunt in your attacks.

You're not taking the mob's ai into account. The reality of what you're saying is this:

IF Solar Flare had kd instead of kb, mobs would fall down, get back up and fire off a melee attack before being knocked down again. You're still going to take that damage.

SINCE Solar Flare has kb, those same mobs go flying through the air, land outside the radius of the attack, and then get up and fire off their ranged attacks - which are weaker. Now, you don't have to do anything besides work on the guy you missed, because those mobs' ai dictates that - if they're melee mobs - they switch to their melee attacks and close the distance to accomodate.

The end result of both is the same. You take one retaliatory strike in between flares. With kb you take the weaker ranged one.

There are always downsides, it's just that everyone knows them. Just because Dechs didn't point them out doesn't mean he didn't know they were there. Quite frankly the only relevant downside you pointed out was that it places the mobs out of melee range. That might complicate things, but if you use kb correctly the downsides can be minimized.

EDIT: GET OUT OF MY HEAD, DECHS!! got your post in ahead of mine.

I'll conditionally disagree with this. Okay it's a minor nitpick, but a better way to state it would be that there will always be one build that will outperform the others given the same player at the helm, and that build isn't always going to be the one that looks best on paper. The one build to rule them all is a fallacy just like it's a fallacy to say that there are two players in this game of equal skill.

Why? Because the two are interdependent. A player who is exceptionally skilled at playing one build of warshade might be less than effective on another build. That other build might have more recharge, optimized slotting and all three forms, but if that player can't use that build effectively he or she would be better off on the build they know. Depending on the other build and the skill of the player, that first build - even if it is less damaging on paper - might be used to outdamage the latter build.

To put it mathematically, to say that one build is always going to be the superior build is fallacious simply because a build by itself is an incomplete equation. It leaves out the player. Just as a character in game can be mathematically defined with mathematical formulae like dpa, dps, mitigation, dpe, and [insert random Arcanaville-originated term], a human player can be quantified by looking at age, IQ, reaction time, mental stamina, etc. The fact that the latter can't realistically be measured and analyzed by someone on the boards doesn't change its effect on the former.

Now you could say, for example, that tri-form warshades out-damage human form warshades on average, and no one here - even AlienOne - would argue with you. That's a good bit different than saying one build will always outperform another. The former is a generalization, and a sound one to make. The latter is pure hyperbole.

Here's a question: what if you slotted it in a Single Target attack? Will it have the chance to proc on the single target or will it have a chance to proc for all targets affected by gauntlet?

This. Slotted, Tactics gives @10% ToHit and Supremacy gives 10% ToHit. The def debuffs in mercs (and I can't believe I'm actually going to say something in favor of def debuffs ) is a huge benefit here, so long as you realize you're not going to be zooming around and fighting. Too far in any direction, and your mercs end up out of its radius and drop from the sky. Round a corner, and they end up out of its radius and drop from the sky. Sneeze, and they somehow end up out of the radius and drop from the sky.

However, using it to hover up to a ledge or balcony - or just up out of melee range - for a tactical advantage is awesome with a slice of bacon on top!

Sorry. Color customization doesn't work for Khelds, either.

EDIT - yeah. I couldn't resist that.

Rhetorical question I've been dying to ask:

I keep seeing posts (and entire threads) about people hating the prompt because it gets them killed in or otherwise interferes with combat.

Why in six shades of hell would anyone cast this frakkin' power in the middle of combat in the first place? Shouldn't they be either fighting or using their - you know - REAL buffs? The buffs this power gives are pretty spiffy, but they're nothing to write home about compared to the buffs that should be getting thrown around in combat, and any damage dealer that stops fighting long enough to stand like a moron with their hands in the air until I accept or deny their buff which is both random and minimal would kinda make me scratch my head.

It's not the kind of buff that's going to save the day. Can't it wait thirty or forty seconds until the next spawn?

Don't care much about the prompt one way or the other (I was talked into liking the autohit in closed beta). I'm just askin'.