Speqter

Thunderstrike is AoE Knockdown to -1s. The energy component (2.66 BI) is the AoE damage and it seems to be about 5' from the target.

Not sure on Lightning rod though

Toxic damage is a weakness unique to this set I've brought that up in these 3 posts.

Post 1

Post 2

Post 3

To sum those up. Every melee defensive set (Tanker, Brute, Stalker, Scrapper) has either resistance or positional defense that applies to toxic damage (except electric armor). Every other resistance based set has a heal.

Grounded would make be a great place to add toxic resistance and a +recovery. Add some blurb about being "connected to the earth allowing you to refresh yourself which increases health recovery which also provides some level of toxic resistance."

The health recovery thing works for rooted.

That's exactly my point Energy Cloak is +def all (psi and toxic {which is covered by the positional portion of all } included). Yes it's just one power, but the set still get damage mitigation to those damage types.

It's not as great as the other shields in EA but it's still something (guessed to be 7.5%) and you have as much toxic damage mitigation as Invulnerable, Fire and DA

That's not much of a defensive hole.

*edit*
I'm done talking about Energy Aura in this thread I'm sorry I brought it up.

@Zen_Concern
That's a good idea. Would it be a +recovery per mob in melee or a straight heal this many points per pulse per mob? (or is there a difference?)

@Frosteburn

True it does have higher resists than the other brute sets, but it offers less damage mitigation. Heals (and dull pain) are a universal damage counter. I was thinking earlier about this; any set that can't outright resist a damage type (or dodge it) can heal back the damage taken. The sets with no heal (SR and EA) can dodge every damage type. DA resists everything electric does plus toxic, has a self heal, and crowd control. (but it has the most toys)

Electric unslotted resist (other sets)
S/L 26.5% (22.5%)
Nrg ~60% (DA 15% FA 22.5%)
-Nrg 20.6% (DA 30% FA 22.5%)
Fire 26.5% (DA 22.5% FA 60%)
Cold 26.5% (DA 22.5% FA 15%)
Toxic 0% (DA 15% FA 15%)
Psi 26.5% (DA 37.5% FA 0%)

Electric armor gets on average 2% more resistance than DA and 4% more than FA (this doesn't include the defense DA gets)

Yes Elec aura gets some cool tricks. The end drain resistance is great (DA gets some too) not too sure about the slow. But us that really worth having the only set that can't recovery from a damage type?

Now I realize outside of Vahz and high level arachnos toxic isn't that prevalent but just go look at a couple of the survival guides around (Arcanaville's is a good one) healing is quite a damage mitigater. Look at regen they got all heals because they have no resistances (except a tiny bit in resiliance).

Basically those mildly higher resistance numbers don't actually add up to make a more survivable brute.

*edit*
If you use 1 def=2 res Energy Aura gets an average resist of 31.7%...that's a level of base resists that a heal is no longer required.

I can tell you from /EA that end drain is a problem when you have power sink and that's when you dodge most of it.

Mu, Longbow, CoT air mage's, I've heard rumors of Malta in the high game all drain endurance.

I doubt lightning field recovers end (someone suggested it should earlier)

From the 13 levels of elec melee (brute), 18 lvls of elec manipulation (blaster), and elec blaster primary. The end recovery from single target elec attacks is laughable it's a % chance for a portion of the end used to be returned

Translation: You'll get 2-4 end points back every 5 attacks or so.

I love the end drain resistance (80% in static alone) I can get hover, or CJ/Acro to deal with KB/KD but nothing else in the game can protect me from all the end drain mobs. (if they aren't bad now wait until 40.)

I can't say this enough. There is no need to plea bargin better powers for this set, it is underpowered. We should be getting something to bring it up not trading away our unique qualities to cover a hole.

I'm still pushing for a +recovery (75-100%) to be added to grounded.

If you read the description on the character creation scree ( I didn't until the third time)

It expressly says no heal and no toxic resistance.

Which makes thsi set unique in 2 bad ways
1) The only resistance based set with no heal power
2) The only "armor" set without Toxic resistance or defense. Seriously EVERY SINGLE OTHER SET has some amount of toxic resistance.

That's bad form devs too many holes.

This was my experince with my lower level brute (9-13)

At lvl 9 many of the objects were lvl 10 or 15 and it was pointless to smash them up .

The cars exploding were cool but for a melee who gets no KB protection and before my stauts toggle, the stun, damage and knockback sucked.

When a sidequest is earned please put clue found, and remove them from the map or grey them out or something when completed.

when you exit a sidequest it takes you out of the misison.

The citizens running away into buildings is great, and being able to attack them is fun. But pets and NPCs wasting their time on them is frustrating.

Overall I enjoy them though, they are an awesome idea....a little tweaking is still needed.

It's affected by fury now. It's in one of Castle or Positrons posts.

Freaks might be a bad testing choice since the "metal" freaks take extra energy damage.

I wanted to make something clear. By no means do I feel any amount of defense should go below the 5% mark.

Good news on the end drain protection/slow resist powers.

I just did a quick test in Siren's Call with an electric armor brute (thanks Tech Wolf).

I used Transfusion from the kinetics line 3 slotted for end drain.

Base is ~39 end drained
with Static ONLY that was reduced to ~7 end drained.

That's a 80% reduction in the end drained from the toggle alone...I'd love to see what the toggle and passive can do.

With lightning reflexes the slow from one siphon speed was negligeable (I'd guess 15% slower), but I was informed multiple slows are noticable.

On the whole this change is good. My /EA brute gets hit less on test than on live and it's great.

Where this becomes a problem is with higher accuracy mobs (AVs and such) that can no longer be floored to 5%.

To use a worst case scenario, Infernal. It takes slightly over one hit from him to kill my /EA brute. My main defense was to use overload so he couldn't hit me (unlike other sets this gives a +HP).

Now on test he'll get an AV and lvl acc bonus (the negatives of this are most evident in MoG). This will at least double the hits I'll take during the fight.

I propose one of the following to allow the tier 9 defense powers to operate at the 5% limit still.

1) No longer bound the to hit calculation at 5% before multiplying accuracy

2) Allow the tier 9 powers to get applied after the accuracy calculation (making them better than lucks and toggles which can't floor all oponents)

3) Have extra defense act as an acc debuff to allow asymptotic approach of 5%.

My understanding is when a brute hits a boss, all the jumps afterward do more damage. Compared to when a brute hits a minion and it arcs off.

So if you hit a boss do the jumps do more than if you hit a minion?

*edit*

Mr. Quizzle you make me a sad Brute (see post below)...unless it's a bug ?

Drop the fighting pool. Get thunder strike at 8 and CJ at 6....I'm seeing elec/elec as a potential AoE killer. By 8 I already have 3 and once I round up 8 or so minions I can take them out iwth JL + TS.

I agree with you Ninelives. The set would be very well balanced to me if there were a +regen on the order of fast healing in the grounded power.

This set is never getting a heal or toxic resistance. The description says so. As much as I'd like a self heal, a +regen is about all it needs.

I disn't say I was being pigeon holed into SJ, I said I'm going to take SJ anyway so one more power (acro) doesn't bother me. I don't need knockback protection I just find KB annoying and I don't want to deal with it. It's a sacrifice I'm willing to make.

For calculations a heal (when averaged over time) can be treated as more resistance. I do view the lack of heal as a weakness. I felt subpar fighting oranges with my EA until I picked up Aid Self.

I'll have to accept your view of DA since I haven't played one past lvl 10.

[ QUOTE ]
Likewise FA needs enemies within range to recover endurance while Elec Armor can reduce its endurance cost without nearby enemies

[/ QUOTE ]

Conserve power is 90 sec of every ~6 min. FA gets their end recovery power (on a ridiculous timer) at level 20. This power operates similar to Elecs lvl 35 power.

I didn't include it earlier but using the 1 def=2 res idea EA's resist average is close to 32% in comparison to Elec's 27%.

Assuming those numbers I came up with are any acurate metric that drops the numbers to

Fire 6 +'s, 10 -'s
DA 9 +'s, 5 -'s (no ++ for crowd control)
Elec 7 +'s, 9 -'s

This still leaves DA on top by a little.

*edit*
But a lot of my suspicion of this set hinges on the slow and end drain/-recovery is. If those let me ignore sappers, carnies and longbow. While sprinting across quicksand.....I've got no argument about the set. All those "exotic" defenses would make the set worthwhile. If they are as I suspect they are hardly noteworthy at all.

Grounded is the auto Energy/Negative Energy resist power. Lightning reflexes is the quickness clone.

I agree there is some merit to individuality among the sets, and I'm not advocating changing that.

People should remember that this set is in testing, meaning it isn't necesarily balanced.

I'm not for plugging all the holes. My question for now is: are the benefits it recieves enough for the holes it has?

If we compare average unslotted resists (among the resist based sets we see)
Fire- 22.5%
DA- 24.6%
Elec-26.7% (assuming 26.5 for each toggle and 7.5 for the passive)

So it has slightly higher average resistances.

Let's compare benefits
<ul type="square">
Fire.....................DA.....................El ec
-No psi res...........+Psi res.............+Psi res
+Toxic res...........+Toxic res..........-No toxic
+Damage aura.....+Damage aura......+Damage aura
-No TP res...........-No TP res...........+Tp res
-No fear res.........+Fear res...........-No fear res
-No KB/KD...........-No KB/KD...........-No KB/KD
-Immob res..........+Immob res.........-Immob res
+Self heal............+Self heal...........-No self heal
+End recovery.....-End recovery........++End recovery
-Crowd Cont........++CC...................-CC
-Stealth...............+Stealth..............-Stealth
++dam(FE, burn)..-Bonus damage......-Bonus damage
-Slow resists........-Slow resists.........+Slow resists
-End drain res......+End drain res........+End drain res
-Debuff................+Debuff (-Acc)......-Debuff[/list]
This adds up to
Fire 6 +'s, 10 -'s
DA 11 +'s, 5 -'s
Elec 7 +'s, 9 -'s

Now this is just straght adding. I could skew the numbers with interpretation by saying a heal is worth 2 +'s, the second end recovery isn't worth any +, the slow resist couldn't be very much at all..no + for it. Also that fire's 2 +'s for bonus damage aren't worth anything as is. That the 7 toggles DA has in it's primary are a -.

Then I'd get
Fire 5 +'s, 10 -'s
DA 12 +'s, 6 -'s
Elec 5 +'s, 9's

But those numbers aren't entirely accurate.

My concern isn't that I get the most awesome set possible. I want a set, that while it's still in testing, can be brought up to be balanced with the other sets (not fire though....).

I believe without at least one of the holes of the set being plugged (I'd like if it was the healing hole, but I like SJ) that this set will lag behind other sets. I'm using these observations because while I will test out the elec brute, without a level bump I will not reach a high enough threat level to extensively test this set. (it's been 6 months and I've got 1 lvl 40).

from Tal_N
[ QUOTE ]
I know knockback protection is something alot of people hate, but the fact is that in order to put it back in you'd need to lose something in return. Maybe alot in return, endurance drain protection seems most likely and perhaps teleport protection would have to go to since these are 'exotic' defences. Now some will say yes to stripping those out. But if you do then Elec Armor suddenly only has a few things to make it unique. The endurance reduction powers and a damage aura.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'd argue that is only the case if the set had the right benefit to hole ratio to start with. I haven't proven that it's not that way already but I don't feel that by removing 1 (e.g. KB protection, a heal, or add +regen to a power) of the sets weakness this set would be unbalanced.

Since this set is still in being balanced there is no need to give and take to maintain balance. EA was found underperforming and was given a buff. If elec is underperforming it should recieve a buff in some way to raise it up not shift weaknesses around. Preserve the uniquiness that's there. If the set is lacksingadd too it.

First off, great update. I really like it.

3 issues

1) The first 3-4 time bonuses (mainly arrests) didn't get applied when they were awarded.

2) MM pets and the NPC villain attack the citizens too much, could they run into buildings and dissapear once attaked....or let us take them out.

3) Label the extra mission objectives. My team and I had no clue what the new objectives were. Even the ones we had done stayed on the map. Nor could we make them a team objective so at one point we all ran in different directions.

4) some of the police Sgts. showed up as lvl 10 in a lvl 40 misison

but keep up the good work.

This makes me a sad hero/villain. I've been holding off on building up our SG base until the I7 small group help.

We have no interest in PvP. All we want is a place to rez, maybe a telepad, and a big room to meet in. (read &gt;750k prestige)

Why isn't there a new power/control room? Or non-pvp option discounted base prices? THAT would have helped us out. This is a slap in the face (that makes 2). The first came after the talks of bases and how we'd be able to buy stuff with lvl 50s. Then they removed inf gain after 35, gave us an obscene exchange rate....and personally my higher level (50, 34, 31, 30 toons) have been through all those levels and weren't compensated with ANY prestige.

Please give us smaller casual SGs a way to get some function out of our bases.

I remember that this game drew me in because there were no stupid time sinks (like bases are) I was advertised content without being told it's true nature and that pisses me off.

*edit*

Forgot to provide thoughts on empowerment stations.

These are extortion level prices for subpar benefits. I agree with above posters stating it should be a click buff, or last longer,and cost less. Being able to sell our salvage for a decent prestige price would be nice. I've seen good work from cryptic this issue, and this isn't even close. Realize this for the mistake it is and come up with something useful please.

Once again...these empowerment stations do NOTHING to help the small SG, and that's what they were supposed to do.

Just as an initial observation on the set, and having recently played an EA brute. I have several thoughts.

1) Conserve Power and Power Sink in the same set are redundant.

2) Conserve power with it's 90 sec up ~500 sec recharge isn't to useful except against long fights against single foes.

3) Unless this set has far more resists then fire, it will underperform without a heal.

4) Replace Conserve power with either a Reconstruction clone, Dull Pain power, an AoE foe based heal or add a +regen to one of the other toggels.

With a self heal this set will have recieved compensation for it's status resist holes.

Also how many other defensive sets don't have a heal? Two and they are both defensive, SR and EA. (Stone gets +regen and +hp). While I like the differences between powersets I also think you should ask why the other sets work or don't work and learn from that. But those are just my initial observations I haven't had time to get past lvl 3.

Summary:
*no way to test the whole pool unless you're already 49
*Feel of play is more important than numbers.
*Patron powers
*being permanent

Just voicing my opinion here.

I don't like the idea. Especially for the impossibility of testing. How do I test it? Go to the test server at 41 and go through a mission or arc 4 different times to test the first power?

Not good. I thought my blaster would be great with the munitions APP. Passive res (good), extra hold (great), AoE sleep (skippable), Long range snipe (yes please).... do I have it? No, because I went with fire, it's way better for me, but it didn't look that way on paper (it was my least favorite).

My point? I had all the numbers for all the APPs and thought I knew what would work...I was wrong. Even if the devs give us all the data for the powers (which I like) that's not enough information to pick the pools.

Plus pools compliment your exisisting power choices, and play style. If you ever change your primary, secondary and power pool picks to suit a different style your patrons powers could no longer fit into your play style.

Please add a betrayal arc or allow to respec the patron powers

@ EvilGeko

I've been kicking around ideas for the lvl 32 power. Every melee defense set except (ice, fire, and dark) has some godmode power that lasts for 3 minutes. Why doesn't the rez in fire and dark grant similar status?

You've already been defeated to use this (no need for the statues drop at the end) have it grant an unenhanceable unstoppable level resists, end regen, +100% health regen and last for 90-120 sec.

I agree with making temp protection a status resist toggle, drop the resists. It should have fear resist too, someone on fire fears very little.

I'm not sold on this but what about making burn into "Blinding Flames" and have it either grant a +def or -acc (foe) because they have a hard time seeing you.

Badges (mostly) do nothing for you. On the hero side there are known combinations that will give you +10% health, +5 endurance etc (check out vidiotmaps for Accolade badges)

The five "titles" are difficulty settings.
villanous-even level mobs(enemies), no bosses
second -even lvl mobs (but more of them) but now you get bosses
third- +1 mobs about same number as the first difficulty
fourth-+1 mobs but more than previously
fifth-+2 mobs and Arch Villians (read need a team to defeat) solo
Also you get more experiance points (xp) for completing misisons of higher difficulty.

There are ferries hit m or click map by your mission menu. There should be a green dot near the bottom right of your map that says "Port Oaks" or Rogue Isles Ferry. If there isn't go to the bottom right of the map and bring up the menu there. Double chack and make sure that all the options have a blue circle by them (this makes them pop up on the map).

Yes you can out-level contacts. You will normally open up new contacts every five levels and outlevel them after five levels....

That isn't too clear. Let's say you started with Kalinda. She'll give you missions until you complete all hers, or you hit level 5. Then she'll send you to a new contact. Once you hit port Oaks you have to do "newspaper" missions. You go talk to your broker (your only contact in the zone) Then you can click on the newspaper at the top of your contact list to get missions. This is how to get contacts past Mercy Islands.

I'm too fuzy on when contacts quit giving missions to offer advice on outleveling them. I can say that you will miss content at the lower levels unless you die to get debt and do all missions on the lowest difficulty.

I'd pick some contacts who look interesting and do their missions and grab the other stories on another character.

Of course they do...you just have to find the right woman. When my wife and I were dating I used to use lines from Johnny bravo lines on her all the time.

If any of you have heard those lines they're pretty bad (but hilarious)

There is something up with your shadow punch and shadow maul numbers.

6.5 and 11.0 DPE?!? when no other power is better than 1?

might check all the numbers for those powers.