Storm_Wolf

My necro / poison MM took the ax primarily to combat those nasty CoT ghosts and their insane lethal damage resistance (around 40-50% the last time I experimented). Even debuffed they tend to take a while for my minions to kill but the axe is a handy equalizer. :-)

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ArwenDarkblade:
I think that's a terrible idea! I LOVE the Eviscerate animation, and would be terribly upset if it was changed. It's the only flashy move that Claws has now. I can live with the other changes, but if this one changes, I will personally throw a huge fit.

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Shockwave is pretty flashy. But I agree, I wouldn't want Eviscerate changed either. Spinning claws of fury woohoo!

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Sunchild:
In summary, this isn't an argument only against EM (which is deemed fine by the Devs), this is an argument to BUFF Claws for Stalkers because it has NOTHING to be proud about... besides looking whicked-supa-cool.

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The only thing "special" thing claws has going for it is knockback. In PvE this really does make a difference. Honest! I built my claws stalker around the idea of a juggling the enemy. When an enemy is resistant to KB things become noticeably much more difficult.

Is knockback going to help a stalker in PvP? Probably not often.

Should Stalkers with Claws get some sort of buffage to put them on par with other sets? Yeah, probably.

hehe And looking cool helps a lot. Not to mention that claws has (in my opnion) one of the nastiest looking AS attacks.

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Manchuwook:
Well, most folks don't usually slot 3 end mods, so I figure I'd go out on a limb and experiment a lil bit.

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I did that with Short Circuit on my defender, but that's a special case. On that note... is it safe to assume Energy Drain has an animation like the Energy Aura's? A Short Circuit animation would have be a very nice thing to see.

And while I'm dreaming... take out Conserve to make Energy Drain available earlier. Umm and ahh... stick Voltaic Sentinel in there. I miss Sparky.

The endo drain sounds like it would be a neat thing to have in PvP or PvE. But it doesn't seem as though it is giving you a good return for your investment. Well you keep experimenting 'cause I'm curious about the results.

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On_Demand:
I'll write more when I get to 32, but for now, I'm impressed.

If the AI bugs are cleared up, this will be a very strong set on live. The Enforcer's buff's are great, the damage output is awesome and Gang War is a lot of fun. The Dual Pistols are the icing on the cake!

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The buffs are that good? Any reliable numbers on their bonus? I mean the buff seemed nice but it didn't seem anything special to right home about. It sure would be nice if the buffs also worked on you. Gosh the Protector Bots give you some nice bubbles. Why not a little leadership bonuses from your henchies? Every good leader (or mastermind) should listen to the good advice of his subordinates.

As for the pistols... I like them so much I would still play the set if my henchmen looked like girl scouts. Sure the two pistols aren't realistic but you've got a certain style going on.

Actually those girl scouts might not be such a bad idea. I would love to see them using Dual Cookie Toss and Empty Cookie Box. Oh please can we have evil girl scouts? *ahem*

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Maybe it's an issue with Mesmerize -- I don’t' have a high level Mind Dom to test it with. But I know none of my control durations are exactly what I'd call "short." So Mind Doms, does Mesmerize (and I assume Mass Hypnosis, too?) really have such a short sleep duration for you guys at high level?

You're not testing your mez powers on +5's are you? B/c that'll cut your durations down to 30% of what they should be...

No idea why you're experiencing radically different durations than I am.

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Perhaps the Controller versions are longer, but I've have generally never had a hard time keeping a group asleep with Mesmerize - sleeping each guy ever so often as I work over one held guy. As a matter of fact it is usually disturbingly simple to do - SOs made matters worse.

I'll admit that Mass Hypnosis and Total Domination do seem rather short. I solo most of the time so those are generally my least used powers. Otherwise the holds seem long enough to me.

People have said that Controllers are able to "crit" and occasionally affect bosses with one shot. I have noticed this with an Illusion controller I was playing recently. Occasionally I'll confuse or hold them with one application of the power. This isn't a trick I've ever seen my Dom ever do.

Maybe I'm a fool but I wouldn't trade the longer mez times for my trusty Mind Probe and Drain Psyche (no Stam FTW). My dom thinks he's a Psi-Stalker anyway. Now if only Mind Probe was a large blade of psionic energy projected from his hand...

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I just made my Merc/TA on live so I could start leveling him up. Ranged all the way.

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Hehe I recently created a Merc/TA but I put her on hold once I heard about the i7 goodies. BTW, did you take the Merc set attacks? I didn't. I thought it would be excessive to draw both a bow and a rifle.

Ran her through a Relentless mission on Test, something I would have never dared before, and she actually pulled through with flying colors. Having glue arrow up very often (seemed almost perma with 3 SOs) and AoE debuffs that are actually AoE! Fancy that... Oh and serum was actually handy to have around (usually never use it) for the purple boss who started bashing through my front line. Ooo so scary.

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You don't rename your henches? Mine so far are named Chico and Ray-ray. Gonna name my Bruiser (er, the third-tier anyway) Little-bit.

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1st Tier:
Funboy
Shank (H should be a K, but ya know...)
Tin Tin

2nd Tier:
T-Bird
Top Dollar

3rd Tier:
Tiny

Perfectly fitting (but unoriginal) scrawny dude names. I haven't been able to come up with anything better for the third tier. Although Wretch might be a good one.

I'm sorry, but I'm happy that they are not Family looking guys. The current thugs have a bit more flair than guys uniformly dressed in suits. But I like the fact that they "butch" up a bit as you upgrade them.

It would be nice if folks could get a little customization in there so we can tell who is who. The random combinations are fun the first couple times you summon them but makes it difficult to track you henchmen. Now I'm depending on bodyguard to keep me alive and if he (or they) take off running I'm going to be in a world of hurt.

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Maybe this is just because of the lag right now, but I find that building Fury is tougher than it is with other sets, like DM or EM. This too makes it similar to Fire Melee.

i'm still leveling so i hope as more attacks open up, this will get better. But right now, I build more Fury from being attacks than by any action on my part.

this also leads to less fury being built up in the early levels because the pure res feels like I'm not as survivable.

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Lets see hmm hit 15 today and I don't seem to have any trouble building up a decent head of fury. I'm going to guess and say that its probably Jacob's Ladder slowing you down. Just a guess.

I've got a Dark/Fire and that boy can't build fury to save his life. Although getting hit in the head makes him really angry.

So far I have Charged Brawl, Havoc Punch and Thunder Strike. I cycle between my starter punches (and opponents) to build up fury pretty quickly and finish off a mess of them with Thunder Strike. So yeah, I guess I'm playing him like my NRG Melee brute. Endo usage is pretty good at this point and allows me to keep going with a high fury bar.

I was planning on taking Chain Induction at 18... but it looks like that's a no-go. So I guess trusty Shadow Maul... I mean Jacob's Ladder is finding a place in my build.

P.S. MrQuizzles thanks for the pictures. Thunderstrike is probably the best reason to play Electricity. "That's a very impressive Total Focus. Now check this out..."

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I've got to point out that the sideways "Gangsta" shooting is actually real...

This style of shooting was invented in China, I believe, and is called "Bandit Shooting." It's used to (Inaccurately) clear entire rooms. Of course, I may be spewing BS, but that's the facts I've got.

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All hail the great and all knowing Wikipedia...

The specific article is about the Mauser C96.
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Because of the machine pistol variants' difficult recoil, the Chinese invented a special way of using full-automatic models of this gun, by holding the gun sideways while clearing rooms during urban warfare which proved to be effective against the Japanese invaders. The Japanese called it "Bandit Shooting" due to bandits and warlords in China tending to own these types of guns.

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Go figure... my MM learned to shoot from Tommy Tong.

Thanks for the time spent on this chart. I've been planning on working up a chart like this using my trusty eyedropper and the swatches in Photoshop... but you've saved me a few hours (that can now be spent on game time). My seeing eye humans also thank you. Now I just have to bug them for the skintones.

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With red green color blindness, you mostly see shades of yellow and blue but not (obviously) green and red. So having a name to a color will help you pick out the exact color you want. Prevents you from mistaking green for blue and so forth. Most of different types of color blindness seem to see some shades of blue and yellow.


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The blindness part is something of a misnomer. Saying that I lack full color perception would probably be more accurate. For me its as if someone started bluring colors on the spectrum a bit. There is no colors A, B, C.... just B.

In my case dark red/green and light green/yellow get screwy but blue/purple are completely shot to heck. Most folks have 32 bit eyes and I'm stuck with the 8 bit. I need an upgrade.

P.S. Would you believe I work as a graphic designer?