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That would definitely be helpful. CoH has changed hands a lot over the years and design philosophies change as designers change. A lot of the design decisions were made by those long before my time and quite possibly even before Castle's time as well. So, we have to dig through ancient dusty documents and when none are to be found we are left to make educated guesses.

My personal philosophy is to give you guys what you want provided the following is true:

1) We have time.
2) The request is reasonable.
3) There's good data to support the necessity of making such a change.
4) The change won't negatively impact game balance.
5) The change doesn't cause a bunch of other smaller problems.

Naturally there's a bunch of other factors, but those are the big ones.

Synapse

Replace is not the word I would use. I would say Darkness Control is coming out I22 and Illusion Control is not.

What, Assassin's Strike followed by Crushing Uppercut isn't enough damage for you?

The Assassin's Strike power provides the user with information on how Assassin's Focus works. Street Justice and Assassin's Focus do use two separate fuels, but they don't work against each other. As a matter of fact, they work with each other. Assassin's Strike builds Combo Levels and consumes Assassin's Focus. Combo Finishers consume Combo Levels and build Assassin's Focus.

Yes, you do have to manage 2 fuels, but I think you'll find the ebb and flow of these two mechanics to be very natural.

Synapse

As I mentioned, it's not a matter of how 'hard' it is, I just don't want to jump the gun here. I'd like to gauge player reactions first before I go ahead and add this feature to epic pools.

The current design is this:

-While hidden Assassin Strike will deal scale 7 damage and will possibly inflict demoralize.
-When not hidden Assassin Strike will deal scale 2.76 damage (this is appropriate damage for a standard 15 second recharge single target power). Each stack of Assassin's Focus increases Assassin Strike's critical hit chance by 33.3%. Assassin's Focus stacks up to 3 times. Critically hitting will deal an additional scale 2.76 damage.
-Using Assassin's Strike out of hide will remove all stacks of Assassin's Focus regardless if you critically hit or not.

Synapse

This is definitely possible. I'll look at what beta feedback is like before deciding on whether or not to do this.

Synapse

Yes. There is a plan. However, this likely won't happen at launch. We're definitely aware of this issue.

At this point we're tweaking dials until we're happy with where the archetype is in general. This change isn't intended to put them in an absolute place. But, I'd like to have this change make Stalkers more competitive in the single target damage arena.

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It won't have the orange reticule treatment. The bit that is being tracked isn't something that can be evaluated by the code that supports the highlight ring.

The way the player will know that they have max stacks of Assassin's Focus is by looking for 3 stacks of the power in your buff bar.

I think it's safe to say that the original design of some archetypes differ from reality. Changes like the ones mentioned in this thread are the result of seeing a problem and then choosing to redefine the archetype's original design or to stick with their original design.

The case of the Stalker changes I think it's a bit of both. We definitely don't want to completely change the stealthy flavor of the archetype, but a the same time we want to more strongly define them as a competent single target damage dealer. As I've mentioned earlier I can't wait for you guys to hammer on this, poke holes in the design and help us make this change be as positive as possible.

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Major typo on my part. I edited my original post to hopefully avoid future confusion! Sorry about this guys. TL;DR version:

-If hidden, Assassin Strike is interruptible and does scale 7 damage and can inflict demoralize.
-If not hidden Assassin Strike is NOT-interruptible and deals superior damage. Its critical chance is equal 33.3% per stack of Assassin's Focus.

Again, sorry for the confusion. Hopefully that clears things up!

Synapse

Stalkers with defensive builds are more likely to be able to use an Assassin Strike from hide. That is no different than it is on live currently. The intent now is to allow everyone to use Assassin Strike regardless if they're in hide or not. The out of hide Assassin Strike should benefit all secondary sets relatively equally as it isn't interruptible.

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Phantom Army are invincible entities. Haunts can be killed relatively easily. Just how easily will likely change in beta if they're too squishy. The intent is for them to lock down a target for awhile.

The intended strategy is to control your enemies so their survivability increases. Additionally Shades can be healed and buffed.

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Arbiter Hawk succinctly summed up the Stalker improvements. I'll add this though:

Using Assassin Strike while hidden is still interruptible. It is the only way of dealing that massive scale 7 damage and inflicting demoralize. If you placate an enemy you are considered hidden and will execute an interruptible Assassin's Strike.

In practice these changes should feel pretty good. You can open up with Build Up>Assassin's Strike>Placate>Whatever and then go about hitting remaining enemies and building stacks of Assassin's Focus. In a more prolonged fight Assassin's Strike will be able to be used more than just an opener.

This change is also intended to solve the "very efficient team" problem. It's great that your team is super efficient at obliterating enemies, but it's a bummer for the Stalker because a spawn is often wiped out before they get a chance to land an Assassin's Strike. With the discussed changes they'll still be able to use the Assassin's Strike power and if they stack enough Assassin's Focus they'll be able to deal pretty massive damage very quickly. They'll be able to do this regardless if their team isn't allowing them to open up with an Assassin's Strike from hide.

I feel there is definitely a time and place for the Assassin's Strike from hide. The intent here is NOT to replace this power's stealth functionality. When I22 hits beta we'll have our eyes peeled to your feedback, as it will be critical to the success of these changes.

Darkness Control

I'll give out the information that was given in the power point here. We talked about 8 of the 9 powers.

Tier 1: Shadowy Binds (Ranged, Moderate DoT(Negative), Foe Immobilize, -To Hit, -Fly)
Tier 2: Dark Grasp (Ranged, Moderate DMG(Negative), Foe Hold, -To Hit)
Tier 3: Living Shadows Ranged (Cone), Minor DoT(Negative), Foe Immobilize, -To Hit, -Fly
Tier 4: Possess (Ranged, Target Confuse)
Tier 5: Fearsome Stare (Ranged (Cone), Foe Fear, -To Hit)
Tier 6: Heart of Darkness (PBAoE, Foe Disorient, -To Hit, Minor DoT(Negative))
Tier 7: Haunt (Foe Targeted, Summon Shades)
Tier 8: Shadow Field (Target (Location AoE), Foe Hold, -To Hit)
Tier 9: ??? (ZOMG! What could it be?)

At the powers panel, we didn't reveal the Tier 9 power. That will be revealed at a later date, so stay tuned. One thing to note, as Tunnel Rat mentioned, the tentacles have been replaced with more of an inky shadowy feel. Some bits of info we gave out:

Possess: This power darkens the target and gives them spooky glowing eyes and makes them confused.
Haunt: This power effectively places a taunt aura on your target and spawns two Shades. These dark entities alternate between a punch attack and a terrorize attack. The Shades will continue to beat on their target until either they are killed or their target is defeated. Once their target is defeated, they will move about attacking other targets at random. Their damage is pretty decent, and this power offers a fair amount of control. They are uncontrollable like all other Controller/Dominator pets.

I think that's about it for Darkness Control.

We also announced to proliferated sets. What would Darkness Control be without Dark Miasma for Controllers (called Darkness Affinity) and Dark Assault for Dominators.

Darkness Affinity
This power is a proliferated version of Dark Miasma for Controllers. You're likely thinking "why the name change?" Well, we pulled out Fearsome Stare and Petrifying Gaze because: a) Fearsome Stare really belongs in Darkness Control and b) Petrifying Gaze is pretty redundant when paired with Darkness Control as its effectively a copy of Dark Grasp, but without the damage. I felt this necessitated a name change.

In their places we added Fade and Soul Absorption:

Fade is a short duration, long recharge, high defense boost to your entire team. It's intended to prevent team mates from being defeated when they're low on health. This will hopefully give you enough time to fire off a Twilight Grasp to heal them. Internally, I've heard it compared to "a weaker Moment of Glory for your team". I think that's fairly accurate.

Soul Absorption is a handy power that grants nearby team mates regeneration and recovery for each nearby defeated foe. This can spell a massive boost to regeneration and recovery with enough valid targets. Think Stygian Circle for your whole team, but instead of +hp/+end you get +regen/+recovery.

Dark Assault
This power is a mix of Dark Melee and Dark Blast. You've got a fun mix of powers in there. I think Dominators will enjoy the set. It offers a nice mix of damage, control and survivability. It also features a new power called Gather Shadows. This is effectively a combo of Build Up and Power Boost. You lose your +to hit and have reduced effectiveness of the +damage and +effects, but you get both. It's a trade-off to be sure. I look forward to player feedback on this.

As always everything mentioned above is subject to change in beta. I'll be having my eyes glued to the forums when this hits the training room. For those of you who made it to the Pummit, it was great to mingle with you all.

Regards,
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I'd like to mention that my hat is not eligible for such a prize as it technically counts as being my hair on account of me being a bald guy.

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There's a fix for this in the works. You'll likely see it in issue 21.5. Instead of needing to claim base items multiple times you'll only need to claim them once. Then you can place the items an infinite number of times.

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4786 blinks, 4787 blinks, 4788 blinks...woo all this blinking is making me tired. Funny, everyone assumes having super speed means I blink more quickly too. Not true. 4789, 4790....

Yep! Still here guys. Too many powers to create, edit and improve to go away.

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Going to nip this potential rumor in the bud. There is no immediate plan to revamp, remove, alter, change, nerf or buff this archetype as a whole. I never said changes were coming. I said we had plans for the archetype. As in plans for power sets. So, stay tuned for that in the future! (And by future I mean post I21.)

Also, if you didn't see your set proliferated it is likely because we plan on having another round (or rounds) of proliferation in future issues and we only had enough time to implement as many sets as we did.

Regards,
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I do this exact thing myself. First row is healing, second is endurance, third is defense, fourth is damage fifth is 1 accuracy, 1 break free and 1 rez. I am super OCD about organizing it to the point it has gotten be defeated on nearly all of my characters on a fairly regular basis.

Another OCD thing I do is to make sure I never have more than 1 of each type of uncommon piece of salvage at a time. After playing a game since beta you develop some pretty difficult habits to break...

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Indeed! Thanks everyone. I had a great time taking out Lady Winter with you all. Your feedback was very useful.

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Well, we really wanted to sneak in the defense buff while the power's animation was playing. However, +defense buff power attributes trigger AFTER the activation time is complete. That would prevent us from making the power behave in the way we wanted, so we reduced the cast time to 0, and the animation team forced the power to root you. And now you know!

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