WARHED

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You gte luls for sure. Hel I have posted in two threads on this very section about it. People come and go with the need for them. I still think there is a feeling of "lets make a pint of not using an empath" But you wait until late 30s when you get asked if you want to take an SK and help against an av.

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Sadly, I think Issue 7 has might just have made empath defenders almost totally redundant against AV's, and possibly in any team that has any expectation whatsoever of facing one.

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In all seriousness, I recommend finding a duo-partner if you don't want large teams. Inv tank+RA+RecA+Fort+AB is a scary thing to behold, and you can sit back and blast quite happily knowing you're not going to pull the aggro back onto yourself, and their health bar ain't dropping a bit, no matter what you're fighting.

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Indeed. I love duoing with tanks, particularly Invuls. Last time I had the pleasure was a while ago (big up to High Pain ) and we had a blast, tearing through the goons in his Invincible missions like a lightsaber through lard. Despite the fact that he was herding pretty hard, never has empath/blasting been so worry free - Invuls are just so easy to look after one-on-one, and I don't think I took a single direct hit in our session together - heck, I almost felt sorry for the bad guys.

Started playing an old blaster yesterday that I'd abandoned ages ago at L11. Today I was on an L14-ish team doing Frostfire that simply would not consider starting the mission without an empath. Leader eventually took on an L6 who got SK'd (obviously) but it seems that the 'we need a healer' mentality is still alive and well at least in some quarters.

Kind of funny really, because only the day before I did Frosty with that toon four times with various teams with no problems, and though some of them had defenders none of them had an empath.

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Not sure if you can command them but Supremacy stops working if you are invised or phased. Stealth allows suppremacy to work though.

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Aha, I have Stealth, so am aware that it doesn't interfere with Supremacy - however it never occurred to me that Invis would suppress it, so thanks for that piece of info.

As an aside but on a similar theme, I noticed just the other day that I can still command my bots when mezzed! Unfortunately I didn't notice if Supremacy dropped whilst I was mezzed, but my toon was most definitely fast asleep yet I was still able to issue orders, which my bots responded to exactly as normal. Most odd...

I've been considering getting Grant Invis to bolster my bots. I too was wondering what the base Defence value was, and whether it was worth adding extra slots to enhance it.

I know that by and large and on an individual basis most defence buffs are utterly pitiful and hardly worth the effort. Still, I also understand that if you can stack enough small bonuses together it can eventually get to be reasonably worthwhile. I already have my Protector bots bubbles, my FF generator from Traps and Manoevers from Leadership all adding their little bit to my guys defence (I'm assuming they all stack with each other - anyone know different?) I don't really have any other powers I really want to take now, so I thought that something that added a bit more to defence, even a small amount, might not be a bad idea. Thoughts?

Oh, whilst we're discussing the concealement pool - can anyone tell me if I can still command my bots whilst I'm Invisible? What about Phase Shifted? If my bots attack, is my invisibility voided in the same way that Stealth is when you attack or get too close to the enemy? I.E. would I become visible, but still with a small defence buff, or would I remain invisible, and unable to be targeted by direct (non-AoE) attacks?

Opinions and playstyles will obviously vary, but my personal opinion is that Taunt is only any use if you team. Bottom line for me is that as a solo I considered it a total waste to pick it at the expense of a power that either did damage or bolstered my defences.

As to herding for AoE's - other tank types may differ, but my Invul/SS has only one damaging AoE attack (Footstomp) and it's his top tier secondary so not available till L38 or thereabouts (IIRC?) ED came in and my pure soloing days effectively ended well before I ever got Footstomp.

Guess I'm fairly experienced due to time served if nothing else (not for me to say if I'm 'expert') and I'd say 'not many really'.

I have bound keys for quick access to Heal Other, Healing Aura, Absorb Pain and Clear Mind right next to my movement keys. I'm a southpaw, so I use the numberpad for movement and targeting with my thumb on the cursor keys, which are my quick use powers binds. Mouse cursor stays over the team list so I can select a team mate then immediately thumb down on the relevant power.

I have bound keys for quick access to Heal Other, Healing Aura, Absorb Pain and Clear Mind right next to my movement keys. I'm a southpaw, so I use the numberpad for movement and targeting, with my thumb on the cursor keys, which are my quick use power binds. Mouse cursor stays over the team list so I can select a team mate with it then immediately thumb the relevant power.

I also have a few empath specific speech macro buttons in my tray (which are also duplicated with shift+keybinds) -

"Gather for RA (emote overhere)" - probably some kind of industry standard that one.

"Casting RA on $target - be close to them FAST if you want some" - I personally find this one very useful, teams I've been on seem to agree, though I've not seen it used by other empaths.

"$target - you have been Adrenalin Boosted" - as a lot of players don't seem to be very familiar with AB, it lets them know that they can go postal and not have to conserve their endurance for a while. Tanks I've teamed with seem to like it as it reassures them that I'm definitely on their case when they're charging into an assault, or in danger of getting swamped.

"I'm an Empath, not a psychic - so TELL me if you're mezzed with some ZZZZZZZZZ's" - I only tend to team with PUGs, and am constantly amazed at how many players just assume I can instantly tell, through all the graphic effects and chaos of a big pagga, the moment someone has been slept/held whatever. We can't CM you if we don't notice you're mezzed. I only tend to use this one at the start of a PUG, and again whenever new players join.

Oh, FWIW, to players wanting CM - just use some ZZZZZZZZZ's they're really easy to pick up on quickly in the chat window, anything else can be confusing - I've seen far too many lengthy and unclear binds or whatever for 'I'm mezzed'. Worst offender was something like "Oh dear, $target seems to be messing with my mind". Sorry, stuff like that is easily missed.

I used RoF and Fireball quite effectively only yesterday with an L12 toon against Frostfire - pulled the vast bulk of Frosties goons out of the last room, AoE'd them into a frenzy and led them on a Benny Hill style chase around the corridoor (admittedly pretty scary, but hey, me blaster, debt is my friend, right?)

Whilst most of his minions were otherwise occupied, the rest of the team jumped into the main room and beat the outcasts leader into a greasy spot on the floor. Worked out pretty good, only one faceplant, and pretty darned funny to boot.

I team rarely, not never, and when I do it's mainly with my tank or empath, which I don't consider my main alts. In fact, I made them precisely because I found it so hard to get teams with my AR/Dev blaster mains, as I reckoned they might be the kind of AT's/powersets that would probably get more team invites. At the time I made the empath, almost every PUG was like 'we NEED a healer!' so that worked out pretty well.

On the other hand my tank still ended up soloing most of the way to around L35 or so (pre-ED, so it was pretty quick and easy) This was one of the main reasons I never even considered taking Taunt till really late in the game - it's about as much use to a solo as a chocolate teapot!

The vast majority of my experience of teaming with other tanks has been with my empath. She almost always seems to get invited to teams that already have a tank, so I've seen a fair few in action, good and bad, Taunt and no Taunt.

I don't have any experience of playing any type of tank other than Invul, so obviously I can't really comment on any taunt aura other than Invincible (I'm not even sure what the alternatives are)

I do suspect it would be incredibly hard for me to hold aggro without Invincible, but as my tank didn't really team much before he had it, I've never really been in the position of having to try. Unlike Taunt, Invincible was such a good power even for a solo pre-ED that it was a no-brainer taking it as soon as it became available. It's still pretty good even post-ED, so I find it hard to imagine an Invul tank not taking it. Just a guess, but if the other tank types follow the same sort of general pattern, then I'd imagine that any tank lacking both Taunt AND a taunt aura would have a lot of difficulty holding aggro with gauntlet/punchvoke alone, possibly to the point of being a 'gimped' build.

To answer the OP's question - of course a tank without Taunt is a tank. A tank without Taunt...

My Invul/SS tank got to L45 without Taunt, solo'd a lot, teamed with PUGs now and then, no problems for me or any teams I was on. Rarely if ever had and negative comments from team mates about it - in fact only a couple of 'knowitall' type Kheldians ever made any sarky comments (and were generally slapped down by the rest of the team, and in one case actually booted) I'm definitely of the opinion that a good tank is a lot more than just the sum of his stats and powers, and a poor tank with the 'best' theoretical build is stil... poor. I've teamed with quite a few excellent tauntless tanks, and seen tanks with Taunt cause teamwipes by taunting up too many mobs. My squishies will happily put their trust in ANY tank that has his act together, and get 100% behind the job of supporting them regardless of their powersets or specific powers. I've also seen far too many teamwipes caused by impetuous players not letting a capable tank do his thing - you know the ones, AoE's into random new spawns whilst the team is already heavily committed, Nova/Rain of Fire with no warning whilst half the team is resting, that sort of nonsense. Taunt or no Taunt, it's hard to cope with that kind of thing.

I finally succumbed and took Taunt as my most recent power pick, purely because I'd run out of any other powers I realy fancied. I can't say it's made much difference so far, either to the way I play, or the way teams view me. Never had any problems holding aggro prior to taunt with my Invincible aura and judicious use of well timed punchvokes. Not once. So often Taunt seems to me to be a 'save the idiot' power - not always, but very often. Not my job, I leave that to the empaths, if they're so inclined

I can totally sympathise. I now have five hero alts at L45 and I've also pretty much lost the inclination to play any of them any further, it's just become a chore. Have to admit, my scrapper is also the least inspirational to play now - no new powers that I'm really looking forward to, no real need for any more slots... he just seems to be pretty much 'complete' to me. I'm also told that reaching L50 is no big deal unless you want a Kheldian (I don't) It's not as if the game is really 'finished' at L50, just that you don't get any more XP and there is precious little content left. Or so I'm told, never having got that far. I guess what I'm saying is that just because L50 is the nominal level cap, it doesn't mean you can't be 'finished' with a character earlier.

At least I'm in the UK so I'm usually able to play when the server is relatively busy. Despite which, I still find it hard getting onto decent/regular teams (and I've yet to find a worthwhile SG in all this time) I'm sick to death of soloing, I've done SO much of it that it's really become a chore, so I can't even begin to imagine how it must be for you with the time difference reducing your teaming opportunites even further.

For now I've taken to playing an MM and a stalker on CoV, partly because they're very capable soloists (in my experience teaming is even worse on CoV) but also because they're quite different from CoH AT's, particularly the MM. A change being as good as a rest and all that. I'm with you on brutes - IMHO they're just another flavour of scrapper, and just as dull solo in my book. Still, I imagine I will tire of soloing my villains in the forseeable future, probably as soon as they get all the main powers I really want for them, so it's only a temporary fix.

About the only thing I can suggest is that maybe you could try and get some real life friends from your part of the world interested in CoX - surely you can't be the only person in New Zealand who would enjoy the game? Even though you'd probably have to start a new alt from scratch, for me at least it's the fun of teaming that really makes the game, not just the levels and XP gained.

IMO Soloing is possible but slow (and pretty boring) with an empath, but that's not really the point of defenders, particularly empathy types... IMO.

I can sympathise with your situation - until recenlty, and once established, my empath would usually be swamped with team offers almost as soon as I logged on. However, this has really changed lately, no idea why but I'm guessing it could make life a lot harder for new empaths.

I have found it very hard trying to start teams as an empath - a lot of people seem to prefer kicking off with damage dealers or a tank, only adding a defender when they have a core of 'hard' AT's. Few seem to want to start a team with an empath, especially at low levels (I don't think I've ever been invited to a team BY an empath myself)

I'd heard that starting off an empath could be tiresome when I made mine. The method I used to help her get going was to simultaneously create a 'broker' alt for her. Whatever is currently FOTM and seen as 'desirable', something that will get plenty of team invites - a tank (pre-ED) or maybe a regen scrapper. Get them onto a team to bait the hook (easy back then) and at the first sign of difficulty/teamwipe/cry of 'we need a healer' immediately offer to swap out for the empath. Worked like a charm every time. Sure, it does mean you need to use up a character slot and waste a little time on the broker alt to keep it at a similar level to your empath for a while. Still, I found it didn't take long to get my empath established and through the early levels, at which point you can just delete the 'mule' if that's it's only purpose. Worked for me.

I have an L45 Empath/Energy blaster and I regularly solo. I'd wholeheartedly agree with the 'perfectly possible but slow' school of thought. I've solo'd pretty much all my own missions on heroic all the way to 45, AV/EB's excluded of course, and my empath only had two or three attacks for most of her career.

Although I've found getting my empath onto teams generally pretty easy (until recently I'd often be fighting off invites with a stick almost as soon as I'd logged her on) it's actually been a case of having to solo her if I want to complete my own arcs as teams rarely if ever seem to want to do my missions. I've noticed that my empath is particularly prone to being invited by much higher level teams which doesn't help, though my other alts are also beginning to suffer from this problem. It seems like a lot more team leaders are now wise to the tactic of inviting quite a few players who are 3 or more levels lower than them so they don't have to waste time doing the lowbies missions. Can't even remember the last time I got a same or slightly lower level invite, even though my search comment specifically asks for them, AND says I'll decline higher level offers and won't SK. Best way I've found of turning this around is to try to actively invite a single lower level blaster to a duo to get my missions done faster.

I'd also agree that it can get pretty boring at high levels on competant teams as you become pretty much a 2-buff bot - apart from Fortitude and Adrenalin Boost (with maybe the very occasional Clear Mind) you can end up being pretty much deadweight IMO. Random PUG's are another matter - you can usually earn your keep big time in a poor team if you're even half capable, but really, I don't much enjoy only being useful purely because my team mates are... well, possibly sub-optimal.

Difficulty finding teams has been the main reason I've pretty much given up playing COV. In fact, it's pretty much the only reason really. I have other complaints but they're relatively trivial by comparison. Really 'complaints' is too strong a description, but it's late, I'm tired, and I can't think of an appropriate and less severe term right now.

Dunno about too easy... I play mostly on Villainous or the one above and I get by ok, sometimes I have a hard time, sometimes not, and I'm fine with that. I've never cranked it up as far Relentless solo, but I doubt if I could handle it with my MM or Stalker. Tastes and abilities vary, and maybe I'm not a particularly good player. Whatever, the actual gameplay is fine by me. Still, if most other players do find soloing on Relentless easy that might account for many people not really needing to team.

I'd agree that the outdoor environments in CoV are excessively gloomy, dingy and opressive compared to CoH. In itself this probably wouldn't have made me less keen to play, though maybe if CoV had a bit more variety and some more pleasant (or some less unpleasant) places I might be keen to play a little bit more.

Must admit, most of the (few) times I've teamed with MM's the pets/doors thing has often been annoying. As I've rarely been on any decent teams it hasn't bothered me too much though. I'm a fairly cautious player. I tend not to rush in, so it just makes it easier for me to leg it and save my own craven hide if/when it all goes pear-shaped - especially with a pet-jam between me and the enemy!

What has bothered me a lot about teaming, especially with MM's is the horrible lag on CoV. I have a pretty high-end machine which runs CoH, and all the latest, most graphically demanding games with al the options cranked to the max at high screen resolutions and with excellent framerates. Yet get more than a few other players in a CoV mission and it starts becoming laggy/choppy, sometimes to the point of being not much fun to play. I guess this has been a contributing factor towards turning me off the game.

It's true that the CoV mission maps are generally pretty dull rehashes of old CoH maps I've seen many, many times before. Still, I continue to enjoy playing CoH even though I have around 240 levels in 6 alts in that game, and have probably seen most maps... dunno - dozens if not hundreds of times in some cases.

As for VG/SG spamming, yeah, it can be annoying (and it doesn't seem to happen in CoH or at least, I've never encountered it) Maybe the horrendous cost of functioning bases, introduced with CoV, is to blame? I'd imagine that as all VG's on CoV are relatively new, they want/need more prestige drones far more than the established hero SG's do? Dunno really, as I'm not a member of any SG's or VG's. It doesn't really spoil my enjoyment though - I can ignore such nonsense, and being pretty much a full-time solo there's absolutely no need for me to have ANY of the chat windows open anyway.

Sadly, irritating behaviour hasn't just been confined to Mercy Island in my experience. Sadly, I encountered many more unpleasant, rude and offensive players in six weeks of playing CoV than I have in over a year of playing CoH. On reflection, I guess that this is a factor that might have made me somewhat less keen to play any of my villain alts lately.

All in all I could comfortably live with all the minor gripes. Ultimately it's the difficulty I have finding teams, and the woeful standard of play in the few teams I have been in that has turned me off playing CoV.

Grats Stu! Seems like only yesterday that I first met you in the Hollows. Really sorry I couldn't be there (presumably happened Saturday night?)

Ah well, on the plus side at least I now have one more friend with an L50 to bail my sorry [censored] out when I get stonewalled by an AV/EB I can't solo.

Gratz Jane - and RESPECT to the mightiest 'fro on the server

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Well telling people are falling at the wayside without offering some solution isn´t productive too , honestly the most productive is just to make teams
And teach those who are bad players or those that dont visit the forum how to be a good player.
If you are hoping to find miracle PUGS that hardly happens , unless there are 1-3 good players in that PUG.
Now it only takes one or two to get things going in a team, the longer it keeps going the more chances you have that another good player joins .

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If I had any kind of solution to offer I probably wouldn't be posting here in the first place, I'd be playing and teaming. However, I'm part of the problem - i.e. poor/inexperienced players. I'd certainly wouldn't class class myself as a good player (more importantly, I doubt if anyone else would) and I'm particularly, and quite obviously, inexperienced when it comes to teaming. Meaning I'm in no position to be teaching anyone ELSE how to play better on a team. I'd need to learn something first in order to pass it on - which doesn't oten happen on PUG's (well, I HAVE learned not to join PUGs, but that's hardly very constructive)

I'd certainly agree that 'miracle' PUGs happen incredibly rarely. I'd also agree that, at least in theory, the longer a team sticks together the more likely it is to learn and improve - but that's really one of the big problems with PUGs. Few I've ever been on have managed to keep a stable lineup for longer than a couple of missions at most. People regularly bail at the first sign of trouble, new people get recruited mid-mission, and they in turn leave pretty much at the next sign of trouble and so on. No one, myself included, wants to waste their valuable time on an unsuccessful, un-fun team, so it becomes a vicious circle.

Oh yeah, for sure - people who have those powers tend to like getting an opportunity to use them, so they're usually kindly disposed towards me.

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...so far it (taunt) looks too much like a "save the idiot" power to me. Not to mention it's not fun, and I don't want to drop any cool-looking power for it.

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Yup, right with you on that.

I have an L43 Katana/Regen and I consider him to be far and away my best/toughest toon all round. As far as I can make out he's not even an optimum build. Despite which he still has excellent sustained damage dealing capacity and, barring horrendous alpha strikes, his tremendous durability is well on par with my Invul/SS tank. Even after I scrankered my tank, my scrapper still totally outclasses him for damage output. Extremely self sufficient solo or teamed, he merrily slices his way through Invincible missions solo faster than any of my other alts could dream of. IMO 'weak' doesn't enter into it... boring? - well, I have to admit, he can be a little dull and repetitive at times. YMMV.

I actually don't mind being given HELPFUL advice on how to play. I'm a mediocre player at best, with little worthwhile teaming experience, so IMO it all helps. Only way to learn really. Unfortunately good, experienced players willing to advise a newbie like me rarely crop up on PUGs, though there have been a couple who have been real stars (special thanks to High Pain)

My main hero (currently L45) doesn't have a travel power, but I do mention this in my search comment. As a result no one's ever given me a hard time about it - a few mickey takes maybe, but nothing serious. Of course, he doesn't get many team offers in the first place, but I accept that's the price I have to pay for stubbornly sticking to my 'concept'.

Ahh, you only have villain toons eh? (hmmm... posting on the villains forum... could that be a clue?) I find it hard enough getting a team on CoH, but I've found CoV to be FAR worse. Seems there are usually a lot less people on CoV to begin with, and IMO the villain A/T's don't really seem to me to complement each other as well as heroes when teamed.

I have an L30 MM and stalker, and an L10 brute and they've done most of their levelling solo. I've barely teamed with any of them since they were created. Excluding the occasional duo with a CoH acquaintance when our paths randomly cross, I've teamed maybe half a dozen times with the MM, four or five times tops with the stalker and not once with the brute. Sadly the few PUGs I've been on have been... well, with very few exceptions pretty poor even compared to CoH. Still, I guess I'd become used to soloing after lean times on CoH, so coming to CoV my expectations were pretty low. Accordingly it's not been such a disappointment for me.

None of which helps you of course... unfortunately I really have no idea what to suggest

What A/T's do you play? Maybe that makes a difference - some A/T's certainly seem to me to be far more popular with teams than others. If you don't know anyone who will team with you purely because they consider you a friend, maybe you need to consider making an alt that people will want to team with because they think it will benefit them and their team - To be honest, I can't see many other reasons why someone would want to invite a complete stranger to their team, and a lot of players do seem to be very results-oriented in this game

I'd guess that controllers and defenders might be considered more useful in a variety of situations than some other A/Ts. Scrappers seem to be so popular that Cryptic might want to consider renaming the game 'City of Scrappers'. Whereas since ED tanks seem to be... well, not highly regarded by many people unless there's a specifc job for them (AV's usually)

I have 5 alts in the 41-45 level range. Currently none of them are finding it easy to get onto any kind of team, never mind competant ones, but it's far worse for some of them.

My 2 AR/Dev blasters are pretty much pariahs as far as any invites go - no one seems to want to team with them at all lately, and as a result I haven't played them in weeks (they're slow and boring to solo for any length of time) In fact now I think about it, I don't think I've seen another AR/Dev or even AR/anything solo or teamed for ages. Maybe it's because some people consider AR/Dev to be possibly the most 'gimped-at-source' A/T in the game since ED? Personally I don't have enough experience to know one way or the other, and I've never tried any other kind. Still, apart from my pure empath I would say they're by far my weakest alts, even though I consider one of them to be my main. By and large most of the other blaster types certainly seem to be fairly ok (although I did notice a recent thread badmouthing fire blasters, so YMMV)

My tanker (scranker build without Taunt) is also pretty much shunned nowadays (unless maybe a tank-less PUG desperately needs some fool to cop the alpha strike and some debt from an AV for them) I've read more than a few posts on the tanker forum where people have said that they wouldn't even consider teaming with a Taunt-less tank. No biggie IMO, he's much more successful (and fun) solo than on a team anyway and that's why I scrankered him. Barring AV's/EB's he's virtually unkillable when soloing, whereas from day one he's been killed regularly and almost without fail on almost every PUG I've foolishly joined.

My regen scrapper does get the occasional invite, certainly more so than my tank or blasters (not hard really) This is somewhat ironic as I actually created him with the express intention of soloing him when I couldn't get teams. Being very self-sufficient and pretty tough, he actually needs the average PUG like he needs a hole in the head - he levels much faster on his own, and barring the odd AV/EB he has never died solo. The increase in enemy numbers and lack of any support forthcoming on most PUGs (even /regens need love) has been his only significant source of death/debt. He rarely gets buffs or healing when teamed (nor, to be honest, does he really need them most of the time) and I guess that might be one reason he gets invites - maybe he's considered to be a dependable low/no maintenance team asset. Whatever, I find teaming with him totally unsatisfying.

Which leaves my final toon - an empath defender, and possibly the ultimate team animal. Until recently I'd have said that if you want people falling over themselves asking for your company just make an empath. Used to be I'd be fighting off team invites with a stick almost as soon as I logged on with her, but that's a thing of the past now. Last few times I've logged her on I couldn't get a sniff of a team in nearly an hour online. Unfortunately, being almost pure empath, she's currently pretty much unplayable solo. Luckily I have a respec in hand, so I may remake her as an offender, max her blaster set (I've always wanted to try Nova!) and only keep the empath powers that I can benefit from myself, so I can solo her a bit. Of course then she's pretty much dead weight if she does get onto a team! Ahh, the irony.

Well, I totally understand where you're coming from, as I too would far prefer to be on a regular and reasonably competant team instead of soloing. I'm also right with you as far as forming/leading teams goes - I have an extreme phobia where the star is concerned. Unlike you, I guess I have a higher tolerance for soloing - for me, whilst it's admittedly nowhere near a much fun as a good team, I find soloing is still a whole lot better than not playing CoX at all.

So far I have found few missions in CoV that my MM and Stalker can't handle alone (case of having to most of the time) It's one of the reasons why I've stopped playing CoH and gone over to the dark side - all my heroes are facing the Praetorian arc there, and even my regen scrapper can't solo most of those guys, even on heroic when they're 'only' Elite Bosses. I actually found Sea Witch no problem solo with either of my villains (on Villainous) though I guess both are pretty good solo A/T's. Even so, there have been a couple of Longbow tanker type heroes who have kicked me utterly senseless. Must admit, I just wimped out and prevailed on helpful high-levs to pop into my missions and slot them for me. Far from ideal, but it seemed like the only way to clear those missions at the time - not going to lose sleep over it, comes with the territory for a mediocre solo player like myself. At the end of the day though, even if ALL the missions are readily solo-able, it doesn't change the fact that both of us would prefer to do them with a team.

My experiences with SG's have been similarly disappointing for all the same reasons (oh, and you can add low-lev SG members totally unknown to me begging for influence to my list of gripes) Anyway, after having tried loads, all a waste of time, I doubt if I'd even consider accepting an invite to an SG again.

Unlike you I've also found PUG's to be pretty much a waste of time too. The only groups I'm aware of personally that seem to funtion well and have any real continuity tend to have at least a core of people who actually know each other in Real Life. As I don't happen to know anyone else who plays the game I tend to just play solo now.