Ultimo_

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"I mean, damage is damage. It makes no difference whether it's from a distance or up close" your quote

Go say this in the PVP forums. And ya range equals alot of survivability, melee attacks often do much more damage the ranged attacks for PVE characters.

Ever hear of hover blasters well they ARE doing that for the good of their health.

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This is only true because there are characters bound to only melee attacks. If the melee classes had access to some ranged attacks, hover blasters would have far less safety from Brutes and Tankers.

I originally made Ultimo that way, as a Blaster with the pools and powers as you describe. However, I like Tankers because of their survivability. THAT is how I envisioned Ultimo, survivable. He doesn't have to do gobs of damage, but he needs to have blasts to be in conception. Unfortunately, no kind of Blaster can begin to match the survivability of any kind of Tanker.

But that's my particular situation.

You don't think anyone else would like to have this available?

Again, I'm not seeing any real reason NOT to allow this. I often wonder the same thing about other power sets. I mean, why not have a Super Reflexes Tanker? Why not have a Super Strength Scrapper?

Obviously, you couldn't give Tankers access to thinkgs like Mind Control, but damage is damage. Really, why not open all the damage sets to all the damage classes (that is, all the blast and melee power sets open to Tankers, Scrappers, Defenders and Blasters).

That there's resistance to the idea suggests I'm missing something, but I'm not seeing what.

Just to be clear, I'm not looking for an I-Win button. There are just some character concepts that can't be fully realized with the current limits on characters. I'm not looking for higher damage, as I say, this might even reduce overall damage output.

Blasters are very squishy. I happen to like characters with staying power, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. I'd just like to be able to make a character that's hard (instead of squishy), but can attack with blasts. Again, I'm sure I'm not the only one. If the damage is in the same range as usual for a Tanker, what reason is there to deny this?

A Kheldian might work, but your concept is decided for you, and the AT is not available to many players (including me).

You say melee toons are supposed to be melee toons, I say who says? I mean, damage is damage. It makes no difference whether it's from a distance or up close. Also consider there are Tanker and Scrapper sets that have ranged attacks, this would just give them MORE ranged attacks at the cost of some melee attacks.

You say I'm trying to get more attack powers, when whay I'm after is more versatility. Variety is the spice of life! Ranged damage is typically less than melee damage, so I would expect Tankers with Energy Assault (for example) to do less damage with the ranged powers in the set than they would with the melee powers in the set. Melee would still be the preferred mode of attack, you would just have the option of attacking from further out.

Hovering in armored safety is not as likely as you make out, I think. First, range is not the defense people make it out to be, especially at higher level. Ask any Blaster. Second, melee attacks in a set would still be preferred over range because of the superior damage of melee powers. Finally, you'd be giving up a fluid attack chain of melee attacks to gain the versatility of ranged attacks.

A fire tank gets Fireball and Fire Blast? I didn't know that, unless you're talking about Ancillary pools. If so, I reiterate that those come rather exremely late in the character's career. I'm thinking of a way to make it possible to make characters in conception right from the get-go.

I'll also clarify, I'm not trying to actually make Iron Man. I'm trying to make Ultimo. Back when I made the Ultimo comics, he was an armored hero and his powers included energy blasts (similar to Iron Man, but different in other ways). There's currently no way to make a tough hero with blasts of any kind. Only Blasters and Defenders get blasts, and they're very squishy, which is out of the concept, and my preferred playstyle (ie. being the tough guy). I'm just looking for a way to allow this kind of character to be realized.

The Dominator sets seem to be in the ballpark of normal Tanker damage (according to Mids'), so I thought that these sets might be perfect for this. Of course, it might be necessary to work Taunt in there somewhere, perhaps in place of the usual Snipe power?

Ya, that was the original plan, but those are only available after L40, which is a looooongg time to wait. I just thought this would be an idea that would work right from the get go, and would still be appropriately balanced.

I mean, if I'm making a character based on Iron Man (as an example), I'm going to want him to be like Iron Man now, not 8 months from now.

I'm curious to know what people would think if Tankers had access to ranged attacks?

I mean, it seems to me that damage is damage, whether it's from melee or range, so what difference does it make if the tanker has ranged attacks, if you see what I mean?

This comes to mind because I've made a number of NPCs for the MA, and in the case of most of the "tankerish" characters, I've given them the Dominator Assault sets instead of the straight melee or Ranged sets. It helps enormously with certain concept characters (like Iron Man types, who are supposed to be tough, but also have blasts).

Damage output would still be in the usual Tanker range, so I don't see it stepping on the toes of the Blasters any more than they step on Scrappers' toes now.

I anticipate the cries of "TANKMAGE!" but again, damage would still be in the usual Tanker range (lower, in fact, since ranged attacks do less damage in general than melee), and damage is damage, whatever the source.

The only thing I'm not certain of is how it would affect aggro control. That is, for ranged attacks, would the Gauntlet aura happen around the Tanker or the Target?


What do you think? What if they proliferated a few Energy/Electrical/etc. Assault sets over to Tankers (and possibly other melee characters)?

That would have been Necross, on a previous page... Page 4 for me, of 5 pages...

Hmm. Point well taken....

Tanker and Tanker. I hate rushing. The zerg is the cause of more defeats than anything else.

Survivability ftw.

Well, L13 now, and STILL enjoying it. He's still got minimal defense and almost no offense, but he's balanced at least,

In a different thread there were a few comments about the build, but nothing here, and it's here that I had hoped to get advice, since I don't play Defenders much and have little confidence in Force Fields...

I'd been thinking of switching to Medicine for Aid Self in place of Leadership. What say you, veteran Defenders?

Ya, that's what I did with the ersatz Avengers, but there's just three of them (for now). The Justice Leaguers are more numerous...

It's just an annoyance.

I actually play across many servers, but there are two groups of characters I wanted to assemble into private SGs, on Justice (my Justice League homages) and Infinity (I think, my Avengers homages).

Hm. This is a niusance.

I hope the devs will change this, at least to let us promote or demote people that aren't online!

I checked. It was the thread in which I was trying to get suggestions for building a character based on Dr. Doom. Somehow, it transformed into a discussion about Mastermind attacks. You definitely posted, but I didn't look to see how often, it might have just been once.

Not relevant to this thread though.

I've been making a few characters lately, and I want to put them all in my own supergroup (basically, a group just of my own characters, at least for now).

Is there a way for me to invite and promote my own characters, or am I forced to recruit someone so they can invite each character one at a time?

If there's not, I suggest such a mechanism be created... Say, invitation by ingame email...?

As I say, there was a whole thread that went into this, and I'd rather not open that can of worms again.

I suspect you know from other threads that I've already said MM damage (personal damage, not overall or pet damage) is too low, and you're baiting me. That would be trolling, so don't do that.

(Actually, I know you know it, since you posted in the thread I made that ended up discussing it)

Heh, side switching is going to be interesting....

Imagine Siren's Call with 50 Villain Stalkers vs 50 Hero Stalkers...

Nope, never done that. I've sometimes wondered how it would play, though...

Sigh

I'm not backtracking when I run further tests in an effort to reproduce results. If I say something happened, then IT HAPPENED. My interpretaion of the reasons for the occurrence may not be correct, however, and I'm quite prepared to adopt alternative explanations when appropriate. I think I've shown that here and elsewhere.

The three hour run was obviously an aberration. I've said that already. I ran a further test and couldn't reproduce that result. I've said that too. His results were similar to those I achieved in my second test (a more valid test since it was one we could both run identically). I'm sure if we ran it a few more times (and I will because I enjoy the arc), I'm sure we'll continue to get similar results. We'll also continue to get very different results.

Last night I ran the mission against the Mooks in the casino and had to PFF fighting one yellow Hitman because I kept missing him (it was for health, rather than endurance, concerns that I PFFed). Again, outliers like this are not unusual.

I cannot be mistaken about things that happen. It DID take over three hours to do the mission I mentioned. I DO frequently find my characters gasping for breath. My Tanker DID run out of endurance using only KO Blow. These are simple reports of events, there's no way for me to be mistaken about their happening. However, as I indicated, it's entirely possible I've misinterpreted the reasons for these ocurrences. In the case of the Tanker, the problem is compunded by the passage of time and the inability to remember the details of the moment. None of this is deception, but I probably shouldn't have referenced an example when I couldn't recall the details. I simply didn't think we would be stuck discussing the examples rather than the subject.

Further, if I say someone "might" be right, then I mean that. They might be right. Then again, I might be right too. I say I run out of endurance a lot, then it might be my playstyle, or it might be a problem with the game.

I've never claimed to be inexperienced with the game, quite the contrary. I'm inexperienced with specific power sets, but that's not the same thing. I've been playing for a long time. I KNOW how to play. In fact, I take it as a point of pride that someone posted a video of my Tanker tanking as part of a guide on how to tank well (I wish I could find it, I've never actually seen it myself - someone told me about it). Of course, that I play largely Tankers may have an impact on my playstyle on other characters.

That a lot of people say the same thing supports my claim that it's a problem with the game. This is valid when it's a lot of different other people. If 10000 people say there's a problem with the game, and 3 people say there isn't, 10000 times, it's more likely than not that there's a problem (though not certain - see "might" have a point, above). Now, I should clarify, I'm not saying these are accurate numbers, I'm just illustrating the principle. I've seen many different people complain about the endurance issues, and I've seen a handful of people replying to the complaints. That leads me to the conclusion that there is a problem with the game of some kind, and my own experiences support this to some degree. If it were just my own experiences leading me to this conclusion, I would have thought it was something about me or my play. This is not, the case, however.

I haven't done a whole lot of PvP, but my experience of it was large, seemingly empty zones, then ZAP! Assassin Strike! Placate! Critical hit! Dead. Two seconds.

Satisfying as that may be for the Stalker, it's not very competetive. If the pendulum has swung, then it's not an improvement.

Unfortunately, that's a failing in the concept of the Stalker class. Giving a class the ability to appraoch attack and defeat an opponent with little risk of retaliation is a recipe for PvP disaster. PvP has to be a competition, or it's worthless.

Ah, that makes sense! L14 for flight, and the characters aren't L14 yet! Hadn't thought of that.

Grumble:
I have played the game for years, and I've played every AT to at least L20. I've not played all the power sets, but I have a pretty broad experience of the game. I have a good sense of how endurance works in the game, and the failings therin.

The people that say Stamina is not necessary are almost always saying this in response to threads like this one, that suggest there's a problem, and it's usually the same small group of people (as opposed to the people complaining, which is far more diverse). You're putting the cart before the horse.

(btw, it would have been polite to acknowledge that I made an apology)

Oh, I thought I'd mention, I did solo the final boss (who is actually an AV that scales down) with the Defender, without use of inspirations. It took a while, but by using my old tactic of Force Bolt and Power Bolts, I eventually whittled him down.

I suspect if he actually USED his FLIGHT, it might have been different.

Has anyone else noticed that NPCs with Fly refuse to fly (and usually run away instead)?

Glad you enjoyed the arc. If you have any suggestions, I'd be happy to hear them (I've been considering replacing the Russian troops with something a little less culturally specific, say Arachnos, partly to avoid offending anyone, partly to get away from the datedness of them, and partly because custom critters tend to chew up PCs with excessive ease). I used the same tactic of avoiding them where possible. My Scrapper didn't have that luxury, heh.

Your experience was fairly similar to my own, it seems. I ran out of endurance a bit more often, from the sound of it, but that might easily be accounted for by differences in accuracy (ie luck). Heck, I got nailed by Lord Dire with Cinders as I was trying to fly past him with PFF and DB running (incidentally, I was under the impression that defensive toggles don't drop when held, but as soon as Dire held me, I got hit by EVERYTHING - though the powers didn't detoggle, the effects were lost). I think he had about a 6% chance to hit me and he pulled it off!


To Grumble, my apologies, I may have responded with a bit more bite than intended. In my defense, I've been told to stop posting so often that it gets under my skin rather quickly now.

However, I stand by my assertion that endurance issues are present. If you don't credit my examples, there's still the numerous threads discussing the issue that have appeared over the years. If there was no problem, there wouldn't be so many threads.

First, don't tell me what to post. As I said before, I'll post what I like.

Second, the thread wasn't originally about Defenders or Tankers, or indeed, any specific AT. It just kind of went that way.

Third, it should not be required to read a guide to be able to have success in the game.

The game system here uses classes that are not all competetive in the same degree. The playing field is not level. For example, a Stalker will basically oneshot anyone he chooses (certainly at lower levels, like Bloody Bay and Siren's Call), and the same is true of Blasters, to some extent.

No one likes being cannon fodder, and a fight that's over in 2 seconds is less than entertaining (and not much like what you see in the comics).

Then throw in the Controllers and Dominators, whose whole point is to keep you from being able to fight back, and you encounter the same problem. If only one player is able to act, there's no competition. No one wants to be a target, unable to fight back.

The PvP system as a whole is broken. The ATs don't balance against one another, and the powers don't balance against one another.

For PvP to work, everyone must be individually competetive. The only way to ensure this is for everyone to be the same. Obviously, this is not possible here. The result is unbalanced play, and empty zones.

It's a shame, because if there was ever a game that cried out for PvP, it's CoH vs CoV.