dombegone_

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PvP is sadly, one of the pillars of the MMO business. If a MMO doesnt have some form of competition between players (and the most visible and most viable form of this is PvP), there wouldnt be a true challenge for the player, and thus no point in playing more.

There's a reason why Warhammer Online, WoW, EVE Online, and a dozen other MMO's suceed in their PvP gaming. They keep it as balanced, as fixed, and as fun as possible.

Whilst true, there are people who are strongly against PvP, there are far more who live in he "gray zone" between no PvP and all PvP, people who play what they want, when they want it, and expect a fun time, win or lose.

I'm not even an MMO dev and even I can see there's things wrong with the PvP mechanics and how it "feels" on the end-user currently.

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yes. clearly pvp is why the first everquest surpassed ultima online.

pvp isnt what made WoW successful, and those who say mmorpg's should all have pvp i notice rather conveniently refuse to play a game like eve online

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Serve... fault.

Mace patron has two web powers both of which will ground fliers.

Other than that, temp webnades when vills have control of sirens.

If your damage chain is going to be ring, char, and epic blast make sure char is slotted for damage and get more damage procs into that chain.

You should have:
2 procs in ring (purple dam, immob dam)
2 procs in char (purple dam, hold dam)
1 proc in powerblast (kb dam)

Just those procs will add approx 50 dps to your build.

Do you need char slottef for hold for any encounter in the pve game? Nope. It is a great attack though with a very nice side benefit of a hold imo. Treat it like fortunatas treat their dominate.

The fire/rad build I have pulls just shy of 300 dps vs a lvl 50 AV (including LR). I could get it a bit higher with pvp recipies and more purples, but meh.

If everything goes well I can drop an (easy) AV in less than 2.5 min. 3 min is more common though. No insp, no temps, no clicks.

They switched from fly to hover. Hover is +4 fly. Snowstorm is -1.6 fly. You'd need three people with snowstorm to knock a person using hover out of the air.

It does between -50 to -65% flyspeed depending on AT.

Air sup is -1.6 fly as well. So you'll need to hit them with it 3 times within 30 sec to drop them.

If you really want to ground fliers you need webnade/entangle to get them out of the air. Once down a fair number of powers can keep them down.

Or if you are a controller your st immob usually has -fly. stack that a couple times with snowstorm

On the other hand doms were already very easy to solo with excluding ptod, which you could throw all the damage you want onto doms and they will still get two shot by.

I very much agree we'll be looking at a stronger solo AT.

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If you play a melee toon for example, your best chain is Air Sup/Kick/Flurry, how clever is it ?

And that's just one example.

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I don't PvP, I've been in Paragon since before we even had Pvp...

I toyed around with zone pvp when it launched and tried a few arena matches just for kicks, never really had the reflexes for it though. However...

If that statement is accurate and not just hyperbole I'm shocked. It's no wonder the pvp community is so upset if thats the case. Please tell me your exaggerating!

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It's accurate. Flurry is one of the most damaging attacks in the game when you pvp...

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eh..if brutes are so hot why are there still far more people playing scrappers?

lets not forget that many people do not like the fury system.

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Cause blue side population is over double redside pop and scrappers existed a long time before brutes?

Brutes ARE very popular redside, very likely in proportion or even higher than scrappers given the population numbers.

Most people enjoy the fury mechanic, it is especially awesome in early game where scalars have everyone hitting about the same and +dam is extremely noticable. I love jumping on a new brute and one shotting everything with a 'moderate' damage attack until lvl 4-6.

Both AT's are good and easy. I prefer the smashy sets on brutes (ie the tanker attack sets), they are very powerful feeling even if surpassed by sets like DM in the long run.

Pop it down right off the list of powers you use. In fact pop it right out of your build

qr

DM is snazzy st damage, but imo very boring. I ended up deleting my dm/shield at 38. Very effective toon, but DM doesn't embody brutes for me.

SS has a very brutish feel (mainly because of footstomp and hurl, if you like the latter) and performs very well too. The best brute set imo is stone melee, it is very raw and powerful. Similar to DM is blows at aoe damage, but it also has the penatly of guzzling endurance.

stone/fire or sd should be one of the top st brutes, though probably behind dm/fire or sd, but way cooler

SS has the aoe advantage, which imo is ultimately what makes a pve toon.

AV killer - fire/mm
Sick damage - fire/x (fire/fire and fire/mm are proly tops, arch/mm is pretty crazy aoe too, but less st for left overs)
Boss owner - ice/x (I prefer ice/elec for a quick 1-2 hold and very high st damage)
PVP - sonic/em. Psi/em and fire/em are still strong as well.

IMO fire/nrg

qr

for earth/ta; the powers that negate knockback are: entangle, stone cages/prison, and fossilize. I think they are all 10 sec worth of -kb.

So you can glue and still knock people.

This thread sort of reminds me of the Coast Capital Savings commercials:
Coast Capital 1
Coast Capital 2

I do think this game is a solid value, but just the eagerness displayed here made me think of those commercials.

I have on of them. I liked it better under i12 where -maxrunspeed let the combo just tear open people so you could even get solo kills.

It is still very effective disruption though. Why it is good.

3 patch powers that annoy and can be spread out to annoy a lot of people - sand, quake, vg
heaps of -def
An additional 'sticky' annoyance glue arrow that you can easily get perma on two people even if they aren't near each other. If/when you come across multiple foes it is great.
Great -fly, it one shot drops people in hover.
Some decent auto hit powers so even if you are heavily debuffed you can still wreak havoc.

As for stalkers at range: you often get a glimpse of them when they come into render range (or view range). Lots of stalkers just chill out thinking they are completely hidden and safe to.. well stalk.

You catch a glimpse and zip over to their location and bomb down some patch powers thatare auto hit and suppress stealth+stealth IO, making them much easier to see and target, then you smack em with glue and acid (long dot keeps them out of hide) and which point it is phase or die.

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pve wise elec has no equal, seriously yo try a hidden thunderstrike and AS and entire group of ppl all at once, its sick.

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Then you try and kill a boss, and just stand there spamming AS because you don't have any REAL single target damage...

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Meh, spines scrappers deal with the same issue relative to their brethren as well and they seem to manage their 'handicap' just fine.

I wouldn't roll elec if all you plan to do is solo, but if you like teaming it is my vote.

Me I'd go DM if you like to fight groups of 3-4 enemies and elec if you like to fight 5+. Slowing down at the boss(es) is more than compensated by blowing through hordes of everything else.

Yep play what you want and what you enjoy. There is plenty of time to focus on min/maxing on future toons, or this one down the road.

As for your accuracy issues, slot the power with mostly acc TO's (training origin) or DO's (lvl 12+ dual origin) enhancements. It will make a difference.

ime hitting say 90% of the time compared to 75% of the time is the difference between having fun and being hella frustrated.

Also be sure to fight enemies that are close to your level when you are a low level. High conning enemies (ie +2 and more) are harder to hit and take longer to kill. The combination of missing them more and more hp to chew through can be frustrating as well.

gl.

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May I remind the ones who think that the continuous payment is required for the devteam that it's possible without? There are billions, billions of games that do not have continuous fees and that work perfectly well. Such as S4 league, MapleStory, the aforementioned games Age of Conan, GuildWars, Dungeons & Dragons online and Lord of the Rings Online. How can they get by? The same way NCSoft could get by with City of Heroes/Villains.



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You are barking up the wrong tree. You will hear nothing but "get off my lawn".

TBH CoX gets you in every way they can. Monthly fees, micro transactions and paid expansions. I'm surprised they don't offer a direct deposit option for automated banking

Whatever though, everyone wants to make a buck and thankfully up till now the micro transactions have all been fluff.

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Energy was popular when everyone thought it was good and its attacks were mega detogglers in PvP. Everyone realized it actually sucked when Arcanaville crunched the numbers.

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Can't say I recall this for /eng doms. Energy melee and energy manip were largely considered the best for pvp. EM because you could two shot with TF+ET and E Manip because of boostrange, and pb with toggle dropper BS providing incentive to blap players. But the most effective /em blasters have always focused on ranged damage.

/eng for doms was never renowned for its toggle dropping, that was /fiery with blaze not only being omg good, but also the set's toggle dropper while everyone else had a melee one.

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2: You don't need to worry about Targetted AoEs (like fireball) because as long as the target is you the targetted aoe attack will check for ranged defense not aoe defense.

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Really? This I did not know. So AoE defense is only useful for avoiding splash damage and PBAoEs? Thanks... you just saved me some inf if I ever finish IOing out my Bots/Traps.

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You didn't know it because it isn't true. Fireball checks your aoe def if you are the target or within range of the target.

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You're right. Stalkers are much better now, and I often see them going shoulder-to-shoulder with the scrappers and brutes. But the OP was about Dark Melee, and stalker DM loses Soul Drain, which is a selling point to the set for many.

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Yes, but instead it gets Build Up which has a shorter animation, doesn't require a tohit check (albeit one at with a bonus, having a 1.2x base accuracy), and doesn't break hidden status so you can still have a guaranteed critical on that first hit after using it.

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Yeah and Midnight Grasp can critical for a lot of damage. When it criticals, the total damage appears first (rather than waiting for the dot to finish and then add the critical damage).

I've heard DM Stalker can produce a lot of ST damage.

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which brings up a good point. Who rolls DM for aoe output? So I think considering a DM stalker is a good idea.

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They were always there, but now they are all gathered in atlas.

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In case anyone missed this and is still wondering.

They were always there, but now they are all gathered in atlas.

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EM/WP. Em has the best dmg out of hide and TF does good dmg when it crits. I'm pretty sure the elec double crit thing will get "fixed" soon. WP cause you get capped HP, perc, repel resist (can AS storms and bubblers), good dmg resist..and decent defense.

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There is nothing terribly broken about Thunder Strike's crit. It's crit chances make perfect sense when you take a quick glance at CoD's info...that "second" crit you see is simply the "AoE" portion of TS's crit going off, and it (like ALL AoE's) has a 50% chance of happening. The damage is as follows...

[u]TS (Base dmg lvl 50):[u]

96.74 Smashing Damage
96.74 Energy Damage
96.74 Smashing Damage (PvP only, if Hidden)
96.74 Energy Damage (50% Chance; PvP only, if Hidden)


As you can see...there's going to be "alot" of damage figures above your targets head. First, the "split" damage types-->Smashing and Energy. Next, you'll see the guaranteed critical from the smashing portion of the attack. Like Total Focus, Thunderstrike only has a 100% critical on the "smashing" damage portion of the attack...i.e. it's only a "partial" critical. However, since Thunderstrike also has an "AoE" attached to it, there is an "additional" chance to critical off the "AoE" portion of the attack. This critical, like ALL AoE's, has a 50% chance of happening. That is the "other" critical you see there, and 50% of the time, you'll have a chance to critical with the "energy" portion of the attack. So, 50% of the time, you will see two criticals happen, and a total of "4" damage figures pop up above your target's head.


From my point of view, this is working as intended, no more no less. It makes perfect sense once you see what's happening. Now, if the dev's decide that they don't want it working that way, that's on them...but I think it's working fine. In fact, if Thunderstrike did see a nerf, ELM would lose out on damage SEVERELY, as the rest of the set is pretty much "LOL anemic" with damage. ELM doesn't even have a good follow-up attack outside of TS, so in my opinion, TS is having to pull the load due to this..

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I eventually expect TS to mirror TF

They might leave the aoe crit chance, but at the same time the power is getting that benefit and doing damage like it is a st attack rather than nerfed into uselessness like other aoes.

TF has approx 200 base damage and a 1/4th crit from hide.
TS has approx 200 base damage and a 1/2 crit from hide + a 50% change of another 1/2 crit from hide. So 50% of the time you do a full crit with TS from hide, while TF never does more than a 1/4th crit.

They both have the same rech and animation.

'One of these things is not like the other... one of these things just doesn't belong'

qr

brutes level to SO's faster and easier.

If you like to play fast I'd roll a brute. If you like to afk a lot I'd play a scrapper.

That isn't to say either can't play the other way.

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I'm *really* struggling to find anything new and original in the MA arc catalog right now - its all "fan-spasm" content featuring the Council, the Carnies or what have you. I'd kill to see some innovative NPC concept arcs appear in the MA - something other than killer bunny rabbits or a campy fashion show face-off...

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Rubber- have you tried following the [SFMA] tags? Those are supposedly "Story-Focused Mission Arcs", and the tag should shut out the farms and whatnot.

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Ohhh that's what that means. I've been telling everyone to tag their farms with that because I thought it meant:
Secret Farm Mission Arc

I keed.

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It's either SS/Shield or SS/Fire for AoE purposes.

Burn probably gives SS/Fire more mathematical damage. Shield Charge probably gives /Shield more effective damage.

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Yea, burn does a ton of damage if you use your patron immob right.

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blazing aura is no damage slouch either vs spawns.