Titan_III

Do I think they could be redeemed? My faith depends on the notion that ANYONE can be redeemed if they choose to be.

BUT...

My faith also teaches that redemption of one's soul is NOT the same thing as temporal forgiveness.

If they are truly redeemed in their hearts then they would be willing to stand trial and accept the just punishment decided by the court (up to and including a death sentence for their crimes). Anything less and they're not REALLY repentant or redeemed, they're just looking for a way to get out of their just punishment.

So yes, if Keyes or the former Praetorian Emperor were to stand trial, not be sentenced to death, and served out his sentence, he could THEN become a hero... though given the likely length of such a sentence, their release date probably wouldn't be until some time AFTER the heat death of the universe.

Since the desire is to improve PB's without significantly altering the way they play currently is the goal, here are my top three suggestions that don't remove/replace anything.

1) Add -res to all PB attacks (in addition to the -def). This not only improves the PB's damage, but also aids any teams they might be on (and because -res is not something that can be slotted for, it requires no changes in current slotting).

2) Add an additional non-enhanceable component (minor damage and/or some additional debuff) to the white dwarf's taunt power so that it acts as a viable "fourth attack" in the dwarf's attack chain without the need to spread your slots even thinner (because the new effects would be non-enhanceable).

3) Since the devs have figured out how to change KB into KD (with their new unique IO set for the summer event), release some non-unique IO sets with a KB-to-KD IO in them so that those who dislike knockback can remove it from all their powers if they desire, while those who like it can keep it as is. This would also allow for selective conversions from KB-to-KD (ex. removing it from solar flare, but not from the nova attacks or radiant strike) and could even apply to non-Kheld AT's.

All the "boring" sets like broadsword, katana, battleaxe, mace, et cetera really need is some new animation options added to the power customization section of the character builder.

These sets fill the same conceptual niche as Willpower; a simple and straightforward powerset that fullfills its primary purpose without the need to micromanage anything. When I'm just in the mood to mindlessly slaughterize things I pop on my Claws/Willpower Scrapper and proceed to rip things to pieces without having to worry about power combos (or even build-up... that's handled automatically by mashing one of my attack buttons), defensive click-powers, or much of anything beyond where my next target is to be found.

And I agree with what others have posted above... as more and more new sets get gimmicks, the very fact that a set doesn't have one actually becomes that set's gimmick.

Honestly? I could see a "Gun-Fu" melee set that mixed melee and ranged attacks in the same proportion as claws and kinetic melee (which both have a 40' ranged attack, a ranged cone, and a PBAoE).

1) Single shot: 15-20' range; light damage attack (less than normal in exchange for range).
2) Pistol whip: medium single-target melee attack.
3) Kick attack: heavy single target melee attack.
4) Twin shot: 40' ranged single target attack.
5) Build-Up: name says it all.
6) Warning shot: Taunt; you fire the gun at your target to get their attention.
7) Spinning shots: Your PBAoE; gun-fu spin and shoot with a 10' range.
8) Headshot: single target extreme damage with a 10' range.
9) Hail of Gunfire: Ranged cone attack.

You start out very single-target oriented as a price for range, but then pick up your AoE's in the late game to let you lay down hails of fire. Range is relatively short compared to a ranged AT (you get two attacks with a 40' range, one with 15-20', and the rest normal melee range), but still enough to actually feel like a semi-ranged set.

As to an actual AT I'd like to see would be a melee support class. My thinking is that they'd get a buff set like normal, while their other set was a combo damage/armor set that provides them with just enough defenses to make up for their being inside the "killball" (though not likely to be pulling nearly the aggro of the tanks and other melee AT's).

I'd think something like the following (with variations from set to set) would be a good mix...

1) Light melee damage attack
2) Medium melee damage attack
3) Common damage mitigation (S/L/set specific damage types)
4) Heavy melee damage attack
5) Mez protection (4-6 points worth)
6) Exotic damage mitigation (the rest of the main damage types)
7) Melee Cone attack
8) PBAoE attack.
9) Set specific attack power.

For me its Willpower. I've tried other defensive sets on my scrappers and tankers, but I've always found myself falling back to Willpower. I think what keeps drawing me back to it is that while its not fantabulous at any one thing, its solid in just about everything.

While the core is its fast regen, its got enough resist and defense to delay your regen being overwhelmed by long enough for you to take some sort of mitigating action (popping purples, oranges, greens or just running away).

There's also the more subtle defenses like protection from confuse and fear and the increased perception that keeps foes who go invisible at low health from being able to escape and makes widow smoke grenades nothing more than an annoying fx around your head.

Top it off with never having to worry about endurance EVER and that it is almost entirely toggle on and forget (you don't even have to worry about your tier 9 crash since you just lose some endurance) and it really means you just have to track your health bar in terms of your defense, making it much easier to focus on your offense.

----

If there was another powerset I have a special relationship with it'd be gravity control... I've made more controllers with gravity control than any other set. I think a big part of it is that I tend to make magic-themed characters and the glow effects and "telekinetic" nature of its attacks feels more magical to me (also using lift at level 50 on Hellions in Atlas Park is no end of juvenile amusement especially when the number of seconds until they hit the ground reaches the double digits).

The Singularity is the best defensive pet out there... a veritable mini-tank (especially if you have a way to boost its regeneration) that never gets in your way and which you can retreat into in order to send melee foes flying back to a safer distance (especially since gravity has four attack powers where you can slot Thunderstrike IO sets to improve your ranged defense). It's also fun to summon it in the middle of a tightly packed spawn as the mass knockback completely disrupts any potential alpha strike you might have to face.

There's also the incredibly underrated fact that their immobilize powers do not have a -knockback component, meaning that knockdown powers (like lift) will still be able to further debilitate them with their knockback/knockup (who cares if held foes are falling over, they can't attack anyway).

And of course... no discussion would complete without Wormhole... mass foe teleport/knockdown/stun just never gets old. In groups you can just drop them right at the center of their normal spawn and it will actually group them a bit tighter than before. Out of combat it ranks up there with lift in terms of playing with grey-conned spawns and watching them drop from the sky.

Let's see... Things I'd buy on a repeat basis.

The key for me is that I'd be paying for convenience. I have limited free time to play the game so if I could save an hour or more of drudgery (ex. crafting all your common IO's when you hit level 27) by blowing $5 or so that's MORE than worth it to me because I could instead use that hour or more actually running missions (i.e. fun).

With that in mind...

1) Common Enhancements: Right now the biggest time sink in the game for me is slotting common IO's when I hit level 27. Paying real money to just not have to worry about and get back to playing the game is worth it to me. If they started at level 10 and scaled up just like the set IOs you can buy in store I'd be even more all over them.

2) Extra Bars of Patrol XP: I generally run out of the ones I get via Paragon Rewards before I hit the mid-30's slump and would gladly shell out $5-10 per character on extra patrol xp just to speed up the leveling to 50 (admittedly if we get more 35-50 content I might change my mind, but right now most of the content is that band is stuff I've been doing since I first joined the game in i4 and I have no real desire to do more of it than I have to).

[b]3) Long duration inspirations/buffs:[b] There are days when I'd be willing to drop money to just go God-Mode and beat the crap out of AV's for an hour... and its cheaper than therapy. (ETA: how about 400 points for an hour of Ultimate Radial FREEM!... not usuable on TF's or Trials)

Though its not convenience oriented, the coolness of it leads me again mention...

4) Summon Alt Temp Power: It's just THAT cool.

As a side-bar I'd spend 2000 points without the slightest regret (yes, $25 of real money) for a permanent power that conjured up a non-combat pet version of one of my alts (and if you allow it to be given petsay commands like a MM pet I'd probably even do 2400+ points without batting an eye). Yes, I DO RP on Virtue. Why do you ask?

I started a new toon just to try and play whats available to a free player and so far the best chain of contacts I've found is...

1) Tutorial
2) Habidashry through Theiry in Atlas
3) Twinshot 1
4) Wincott through Frostfire mission.
5) Twinshot 2
6) Finish out Hollows
7) Twinshot 3
8) Faultine (Temblor and Penelope)
9) Midnight Squad Intro
10) Faultline (Doctor and Agent G)
11) Mercedes Sheridan (through Crown of Glory)
12) Doppelganger arcs
13) Roy Cooling

That's as far along as I've gotten with that toon so far with a toon who's now closing in on level 30. My next step after that will probably be the introductory Oroboros arc and then the two semi-TF arcs Midnight Son and Mender Lazarus offers which should get me to a high enough level that I can start the RWZ arcs.

Throw in some radios/safeguards and that should offer a pretty diverse array of maps, opponents, and mission elements (including a couple of "save the city/world" bits) for a new player to level up with.

We ALWAYS get a lot of downtime after a new issue... with the amount of downtime being roughly proportional to the degree of game-changing mechanics introduced.

The stated reason for THIS downtime was for a new publish with patchnotes. Since they're pushing that through on a Friday, my guess it that they've quashed one or more bugs they feel are important enough to do a publish just before the weekend instead of waiting until next week to move them live.

That said, the quantity of downtimes always winds down as the major bugs are worked out of the system. Remember that during the months leading up to the launch of Freedom the live servers had very little downtime. Even the scheduled server maintenances took less than the allotted time.

We'll get back to that again (only to have the cycle begin again when we get the next big issue)... but there are still some non-trivial bugs out there to be quashed (for example, I still can't transfer one of my main toons to another server because they have an apostrophe in the name).

My gut instinct is that it will be Manticore by rules of drama.

The rules of drama say that the supporting character you get to interact with most is the one to be killed because they are the one the viewer will feel most attached to. The only member of the Phalanx you really get to meet and interact with in the new tutorial missions is Manticore. You even get invited into his house a couple of times.

Plus he's married to one of THE iconic characters used to promote CoH (along with States, Recluse, and Ghost Widow... with Cole, Desdemona and Maelstrom for the GR stuff) and I could totally see someone in marketing thinking that Sister Psyche being single again would be a good idea just due to the theoretical drooling fanboy angle.

Actually, for me the best deal is to pay by the year as a tier 9 vet. $144 a year works out to $12 a month minus the $7 a month I get in Paragon Points means I'm paying $5 a month for Incarnate access and signature story arcs each month (which is what I'd pay for just the arcs if I were to go premium anyway).

On top of that... Free server transfers to a server where I don't have to listen to people calling me an idiot for paying the subscription... Priceless.

Here's what I would institute.

1) Part One (Old Content Revamp): I would take most of the original CoH and CoV contact arcs/missions, drop them into Oroboros and replace them with mission arcs using the latest tech from GR. One the biggest elements would be dialogue tree choices and morality missions to allow characters to go from hero to vigilante to villain to rogue right from the start of their careers, with the dialogue paths for the contacts changing to reflect the character's alignment status.

2) Part Two (New Content): I would then add hero and vigilante contacts and arcs to the Rogue Isles and villain and rogue contacts to Paragon City and open up all the zones to all alignments. I'm thinking a Longbow Officer who wants vigilante help in taking on Arachnos as one example and Amanda Vines needing a hero to save the day as another. Meanwhile rogues and villains can meet with various fences and contacts to pursue their own schemes in Paragon City.

3) New mission branching/mob technology: The above options rely upon existing tech already available in the game. As such, the biggest hurdle would be the amount of new text and missions that would need to be generated.

But to really make this new concept and my vision work I feel I would need two new bits of technology that do not currently exist in the game. First, I would need the ability for the branching dialogue trees to offer different missions based on which moral choice your character chooses to make during an arc. While this MIGHT be not much different than tip missions, the fact that the arc would need to continue past that choice is why I suspect this would fall under "new tech" and not just an new application for existing tech.

The second piece of new tech that I'm CERTAIN is new tech would be what I call "variably conning enemies." In other words... mobs that con either as allies, neutral, or hostile to you depending on your alignment. If you're a hero, Longbow cons blue to you. If you're a vigilante or rogue they con yellow. If you're a villain they con red. Arcahnos would be the inverse.

Other groups would be adjusted as well... the scrapyarders for example (when encountered outdoors anyway) should be universally neutral (don't mess with them and they won't mess with you). Wyvern might con blue to vigilantes (being of that mindset themselves), yellow to heroes, and red to rogues and villains.

4) Zone Revamps: Until we're actually using all of the zones we currently have there's not really much reason to go adding more. One the reasons for opening up the zones to all sides and adding contacts in them is, in part, to stretch the existing art assets as much as possible. But going beyond that into unused zones I would start an ongoing effort to completely revamp many of the unused Zones and provide them with new art, story arcs, and task forces.

First up would be the Shadow Shard which would be converted from a level 41+ experience into four level bands... Firebase Zulu from 10-20, the Cascade Archipelego from 20-30, the Chantry from 30-40, and the Storm Palace from 40-50. Each would have a contact chain (3-5 contacts with 3-5 missions each) that unlocks a task force.

5) Solo Incarnate Content: I would introduce at least one Incarnate story arc per issue (repeatable via Oroboros) and a repeatable mission contact for those who wish to solo while gaining shards/threads to improve their character. While this would be slower than doing trials or TF's, it would be a viable path for those who wanted to get the rewards via soloing.

I have a claws/WP scrapper and have had the exact opposite reaction. It feels like the most unstoppable scrapper I've ever built.

Comparing your build to mine, I think the bulk of your problem is that you've slotted IO sets for the wrong defenses. More simply, you spent a lot of effort buffing your strengths, but not enough in covering your weaknesses.

Willpower is great at mitigating S/L damage through resistance, but it has only modest defense buffs for dealing with the various elemental and energy damages. Even Strength of Will provides only modest increases to your resistance against those damage types.

Your build focuses on buffing your S/L defense and resistance, while leaving your elemental and energy defenses at the modest default levels. As such, when faced with foes whose primary forms of attack are elemental or energy based you have much less mitigation.

The big reason this is important is that in the late game the types of damage you must deal with shift significantly towards energy and elemental and away from the S/L that dominate the early levels. This is especially apparent with the Rikti, Praetorians and (to a lesser extent) Arachnos who rely almost exclusively on energy attacks.

Looking at your build, your strongest defenses are also your strongest resistances. The result is that your survivability is at its peak against S/L foes, but drops dramatically against fire/cold and is wholely inadequate against energy/negative damage and because Strength of Will does not buff those damage types by much, it provides little additional survivability when faced with those foes.

I believe you'd be much better served slotting IO sets for energy/negative and ranged defense instead of S/L and melee. Doing so will ensure that against the damage types where your resistance is poor, your defenses are much stronger to compensate. The result is that you'll be able to take a pounding from many more types of damage with fairly consistance results regardless of what you're facing.

Here's the build I'm using for my Claws/WP scrapper. As you can see, it has MUCH stronger elemental (31.5% def, 9.2% resist) and energy (48.4% def, 6.4% resist) protection to complement its solid smash/lethal (21.9% def, 50.4% resist) protection. With SoW active, those relatively minor buffs to elemental and energy resistances are multiplied by the strong defenses to allow you to absorb a lot more damage than you would be able to without the high defense scores.

The other nice thing about this build (once the spritual boost is applied) is that perma-double Follow-Up is possible without needing Hasten to pull it off. Yes, the build has a large number of LotG and a couple of unique IO's in there, but every last one of them was purchased via A-merits (two a pop) while leveling the toon up so I don't consider them to be unreasonable for the average player.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.91
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Rayla A'toria: Level 50 Mutation Scrapper
Primary Power Set: Claws
Secondary Power Set: Willpower
Power Pool: Flight
Power Pool: Concealment
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Fighting

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Swipe -- C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg(A), C'ngImp-Dmg/Rchg(3), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(3), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(5), C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(5)
Level 1: High Pain Tolerance -- S'fstPrt-ResDam/Def+(A)
Level 2: Strike -- Mako-Acc/Dmg(A), Mako-Dmg/EndRdx(7), Mako-Dmg/Rchg(7), Mako-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(9), Mako-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(9), Mako-Dam%(15)
Level 4: Slash -- C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg(A), C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(11), C'ngImp-Dmg/Rchg(11), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(13), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(13)
Level 6: Fast Healing -- Numna-Heal(A), Numna-Regen/Rcvry+(15), Heal-I(17), Heal-I(17)
Level 8: Follow Up -- C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg(A), C'ngImp-Dmg/Rchg(19), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(19), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(21), C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(21), GSFC-Rchg/EndRdx(23)
Level 10: Indomitable Will -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 12: Mind Over Body -- RctvArm-ResDam/EndRdx(A), RctvArm-ResDam/Rchg(23), RctvArm-ResDam/EndRdx/Rchg(25), RctvArm-ResDam(25), RctvArm-EndRdx(27)
Level 14: Spin -- Erad-Dmg(A), Erad-Acc/Rchg(27), Erad-Dmg/Rchg(29), Erad-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(29), Erad-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(31)
Level 16: Rise to the Challenge -- Numna-Heal/EndRdx(A), Dct'dW-Heal/EndRdx(31), Mrcl-Heal/EndRdx(31), Heal-I(33)
Level 18: Focus -- Thundr-Acc/Dmg(A), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx(33), Thundr-Dmg/Rchg(33), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(34), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(34), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(34)
Level 20: Quick Recovery -- EndMod-I(A), EndMod-I(36), EndMod-I(36)
Level 22: Fly -- Flight-I(A)
Level 24: Stealth -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A)
Level 26: Eviscerate -- Erad-Dmg(A), Erad-Dmg/Rchg(36), Erad-Acc/Rchg(37), Erad-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(37), Erad-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(37)
Level 28: Heightened Senses -- RedFtn-Def/EndRdx(A), RedFtn-Def/Rchg(39), RedFtn-EndRdx/Rchg(39), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(39), RedFtn-Def(40), RedFtn-EndRdx(40)
Level 30: Combat Jumping -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A)
Level 32: Shockwave -- Posi-Acc/Dmg(A), Posi-Dmg/EndRdx(40), Posi-Dmg/Rchg(42), Posi-Dmg/Rng(42), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(42)
Level 35: Resurgence -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 38: Strength of Will -- ResDam-I(A)
Level 41: Boxing -- Mako-Acc/Dmg(A), Mako-Dmg/EndRdx(43), Mako-Dmg/Rchg(43), Mako-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(43), Mako-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(46), Mako-Dam%(46)
Level 44: Tough -- RctvArm-ResDam/EndRdx(A), RctvArm-ResDam/Rchg(45), RctvArm-ResDam/EndRdx/Rchg(45), RctvArm-ResDam(45)
Level 47: Weave -- LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(A), LkGmblr-Def/Rchg(48), LkGmblr-EndRdx/Rchg(48), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(48), LkGmblr-Def(50), LkGmblr-Rchg+(50)
Level 49: Hover -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Run-I(A)
Level 2: Rest -- RechRdx-I(A)
Level 1: Critical Hit
Level 4: Ninja Run
Level 2: Swift -- Run-I(A)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A)
Level 2: Health -- Heal-I(A), Heal-I(46)
Level 2: Stamina -- EndMod-I(A), EndMod-I(50)

My suggestion for revamping tip missions is simply to add more of them and make them more like the new One Good Spider* morality mission that, instead of relying upon EB's, uses more complex mechanics (timers... especially the countdown to event, side-switching foes, chained objectives, et cetera) to make it interesting.

*a.k.a. one of the most kickass soloable missions in the entire game. I've done it well over a dozen times and it STILL has me coming it out with a "HELL YEAH! THIS is what being a hero is all about!" feeling.