firespray

[ QUOTE ]
I dont see why people complain about Devices. Devices are awesome for a tactician player!

Sure you trade up Build Up but you gain SO MUCH more!

Devices is the only secondary ( for blasters ) that let you "set up" a battlefield beforehand with land mines and caltrops! You can take your time and prepare a REAL ambush.

Targeting Drone: A great power that boosts your accuracy AND perception. All good stuff for blasters.

Taser is a solid Stun that stacks very well with Beanbags or Stunning Arrow.

Web Grenade: Great immob. good vs AVs, great before using location aoes like Ignite!

Sure, the set has some duds or powers that are useful in only a few situations, like Time Bomb. Ive been toying with this one and still cant come up with great uses for it. If only they were giving us a REMOTE Detonator haha. Now thta would rock!

Cloaking Device: A very decent Stealth power that stacks greatly with SS or a stealth IO. No need to waste a power choice in a power pool. It comes with your secondary powerset!

Auto Turret: Decent DPS added to your attacks and it is now mobile! Too bad it doesnt last longer and is so slow to cast...

Overall, Devices is very useful for creative players. And thank god it feels different for a change. So bored of playing powersets that are all looking alike with different colors. Devices are UNIQUE just like Traps are UNIQUE!

Woot!

[/ QUOTE ]

Web Grenade: Falls far behind the immobilizes in all the other blaster secondaries. Same Mag and duration of the immobilize, but the others do damage.

Caltrops: One of the better powers in the set, but it can cause lots of problems on teams if it's not used properly.

Taser: Basically the same power as stun in energy manipulation, with a slightly longer range. Unlike stun though, there's nothing else in devices to stack the stuns with to help you deal with troublesome bosses and the like.

Targeting Drone: Another okay power, but it falls behind build up in a lot of ways. Most importantly, it doesn't give any damage bonus. This wasn't as big of an issue before ED, when it meant that devices players could 6-slot for damage, while everyone else had to 5-slot with 1 accuracy. Now, that extra damage from being able to slot more damage isn't there. It also doesn't give nearly as big of a to-hit buff as buildup does, so in cases where you need a large buff (i.e. trying to punch through MoG on a paragon protector) you don't have it.

Smoke Grenade: It's okay, but with cloaking device in the set already, the -perception isn't really needed that much, and the to-hit debuff is very minor.

Cloaking Device: Another okay power. The stealth makes it easier to set up trip mines and the like, and to stealth missions, but it doesn't do much in combat.

Trip Mine: Another one of the better powers in the set, as long as you have the patience of a saint. They're much better solo than on teams, since most teams won't wait for 5 minutes while you set up a minefield to deal with 1 spawn (and rightfully so)

Time Bomb: Would be a great power if you could control when it goes off. Since you can't, it's very difficult to get anything else to go off at the same time (a trip mine or nuke for example). It generally can't take out bosses by itself, and you could take out a group of minions/LTs easier and faster with a trip mine. So why take it?

Gun Drone: Another power that could be good, but at the moment is nothing impressive. A 6 second casting time for a power that only lasts 90 seconds (assuming it doesn't get destroyed sooner, since it can take damage) is ridiculous. If the pet it summoned were permanent until destroyed it would be much better.

It's not that devices is a terrible set, but it's just not as good as the others, and it's not as good as it could be if they tweaked it just a little. It's difficult to use on teams, since so much of it involves long set-up times, and when soloing, there's nothing it can do that you can't do faster, easier, and often safer with another set like energy or ice.

I'd like to throw a DM/WP build into consideration with the following restrictions.

1. Any IO sets but purples acceptable.
2. As long as no purples are used, any budget is acceptable.
3. Sustainable endurance useage.
4. Highest realistically attainable typed defenses possible without making major sacrifices in damage.
5. Seamless ST attack chain with decent damage.
6. Includes Superspeed.

OK, here's the COH Helper output.

---System information gathered by CoH Helper version 0.1.1.7---

DxDiag gathered at July 11, 2009 08:56 (-04:00)
Operating System: Windows Vista™ Home Premium (6.0, Build 6000) (6000.vista_gdr.090302-1506)
System Manufacturer: OEM
System Model: OEM
BIOS: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
Central Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz (4 CPUs), ~2.4GHz
Memory: 3326MB
.Net Memory Report: 1293MB out of 3325MB available
Page File: 4131MB (2697MB currently in use)
C Drive: (WDC WD5000AACS-00G8B1 ATA Device) 393753MB out of 476937MB (82%) free
J Drive: () 58880MB out of 76316MB (77%) free
D Drive: (TSSTcorp CDDVDW SH-S203N ATA Device) zero-size drive
E Drive: (TSSTcorp CDDVDW SH-S203N ATA Device) zero-size drive
Windows directory location: C:\Windows
DirectX: DirectX 10
DirectX Diag version: 6.00.6000.16386 (32-bit version)

Display Notes: No problems found.
Sound Notes: No problems found.

No problems found.
Input Notes: No problems found.

Monitor: Generic PnP Monitor
Monitor's Max Resolution: (blank)
Video Device Name: NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS 512
Manufacturer / Chip: NVIDIA / GeForce 8800 GTS 512
Video Memory: 1907 MB
Driver Version: 8.15.0011.8618
Driver Date: 6/10/2009 6:03:00 AM
Driver Language: English

Sound Device Description: Speakers (High Definition Audio Device)
Driver File: HdAudio.sys
Driver Version: 6.00.5840.16387
Driver Date: 11/2/2006 3:36:49 AM

Sound Device Description: Digital Output Device (SPDIF) (High Definition Audio Device)
Driver File: HdAudio.sys
Driver Version: 6.00.5840.16387
Driver Date: 11/2/2006 3:36:49 AM


WMI Information
Motherboard Manufacturer: http://www.abit.com.tw/
Motherboard Model: (empty)
Motherboard Product: IP35 PRO(P35+ICH9R)
Motherboard Version: 1.x (BIOS:10)
BIOS Manufacturer: Phoenix Technologies, LTD
BIOS Name: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
BIOS Version: IntelR - 42302e31
BIOS Release: 20070906000000.000000+000

Registry Information for Current User
Resolution: 1680x1050
3D Resolution: 1680x1050 (Not using renderscale)
Full Screen: Yes
Maximized: No
Screen Position: 0, 0
Refresh Rate: 60Hz
Vertical Sync Enabled: Yes

Physics Quality: Very High
Maximum Particles: 50000
Max Particle Fill? 10.000
Physics Card Enabled: No

Anti-aliasing: 4x
Anisotropic Filtering: 16x
Texture LOD Bias: Smooth
Water Effects: High Quality
Bloom: 1.000 (turned on)
Depth of Field Enabled: Yes
Desaturation Effects (Sepia) Enabled: Yes
Shader Detail: High

World Texture Level: Very High
Character Texture Level: Very High
World Detail Level (Vis_Scale): 2.000
Entity Detail Level: 2.000
Shadows Enabled: Yes
Gamma Correction: 1.000
Geometry Buffers (VBOs) Enabled: Yes
Suppression of Extra Player FX Enabled: No
Suppression of FX When Camera Close Enabled: No
Close Suppression Range: 3.000
Show Advertisements: Yes

Audio Mode: Performance
3D Audio: No
FX Sound Volume: 1.000
Music Sound Volume: 0.600

Show Advanced Graphics Options: Yes
Overall Graphics Quality: 1.000
Reverse Mouse Buttons: No
Save Login Username: Yes
Transfer Rate: Unknown bytes/second
Current Game Version: 19.20090619.5T2
Installation Directory: C:\Program Files\City of Heroes

Mod files in the Data directory
.\texture_library\MAPS\Safeguard has 9 files
.\texture_library\MAPS\static has 25 files
.\texture_library\V_MAPS\Outdoor_Missions has 6 files
.\texture_library\V_MAPS\Static has 12 files

My harddrive crashed about a week ago, and had to be replaced, so everything on my computer was freshly reinstalled. Since it happened, I've been having a couple weird issues with CoH that I didn't have before. One is that if I'm playing CoH, and alt+tab to another screen, when I come back the graphics in CoH are frozen. I can still move around, and can hear my character run/jump whatever, but the screen image is frozen. Alt+tabbing back to another window and back to CoH a second time always fixes it. The other issue is that for some reason, when playing CoH, if I alt+tab to another screen, it turns off the windows Aero features. Anyone ever run into anything like this before?

I'm only going to stick to heroside, since that's where I play 90% of the time. That being said, here's what I think is weak.

Psi Blast (blasters): For all the reasons already mentioned above.

Devices (blasters): Difficult to use on a team, and lacks damage. Before ED, it used to be a little better, due to the fact that it did better sustained DPS and only lacked the burst damage. Now it has neither.

Gravity Control (controllers): Supposed to trade control ability for damage, but doesn't really do a good job of it. Fire control does better damage and has better controls as well.

Martial Arts (Scrappers): Somewhat weak on damage, long animation times, high endurance costs, and the grab-bag secondary effects all combine to make a sub-par set.

Trick Arrow (Defenders): Lots of damage-enhancing debuffs (-res, -defense, -regen, etc.) but only minor survivability enhancing tools (-to-hit, -damage, -recharge, heals, etc.) and too much of a reliance on soft control.

One special mention goes out to force field. Not because it underperforms as such (the ability to give an 8-man team softcapped defenses to everything at level 22 can hardly be said to be underperforming), but for the fact that besides the 3 shields, and personal forcefield, everything else in the set is pretty much worthless, and in a lot of cases can be actively detrimental to a team.

In my set, every animation would look like this .

I support the suggestion to make the AE guy not contact you until a later level, but I'm still against removing any of the AE buildings.

My wife's making a fire/rad, and I wanted to make another scrapper to play with her. I'm leaning towards DM/WP. Anyone played the combo? It looks really good on paper. Siphon life and the to-hit debuffs from DM will help add survivability, and with dark consumption and quick recovery I'm almost certain I can skip stamina. I'm also giving Dark Melee/Invulnerability some consideration too.

Any thoughts on either combo?

[ QUOTE ]
I just wish they would let us set mission doors out in the world. Not only would it add something to the mission but it would probably eliminate most of the farming we see. the main reason people do it is because they have to walk only 2 steps to get a new mission.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wouldn't the farmers just still use the mission portal? And besides, that's not the only (or even the biggest) reason people farm the MA. Auto-sk and the ability to create all-boss and all-LT spawns at a single level have a lot more to do with it I think.

[ QUOTE ]
QR

No, "positional resistance" is not possible, without making significant changes to the game. Technically, there's no such thing as "positional defense", either, there's just Defense that happens to be called Ranged_Defense which helps to protect you from an attack vector that happens to be called Ranged_Attack. They could just as easily be called Fluffy_Defense, which protects you from White_Attack, and they would act exactly the same. We call it positional because most offensive powers have one of the three "positional" attack vectors, and because of how they're named.

[/ QUOTE ]

Standard code rant applies, but it doesn't seem like it would be that big of a deal to me. They'd just have to add 3 new damage types, Ranged_Damage, Melee_Damage, and AOE_Damage and 3 new resistance types to go with them.

Now that being said, I still don't think it's a good idea, it just doesn't make any sense.

To use the analogy between chainmail and kevlar, the difference between a knife and a bullet and the protective power of the armor doesn't have anything to do with the fact that they're melee or ranged attacks. Kevlar can't stop a knife because the point of the knife concentrates the force on just a few fibers of kevlar and it can penetrate them, whereas a bullet contacts many fibers, and the fact that they can stretch and spread out the force of the bullet keeps it from penetrating. A knife thrown from range and one held in your hand, both with the same amount of force behind them would penetrate kevlar with the same ease.

Nope, definitely not. I still love freedom. I don't mind farming myself, and there's still plenty of people on freedom to run normal teams with if you go looking.

You can also get it as a random rare recipe roll, either rolling with merits, or rolling the gold recipe roll with tickets. The chance of getting one that way is much higher than the chance of getting one from a random enemy drop.

[ QUOTE ]
1) Micro-transactions, as contemplated here, give an advantage, but "unfair" is a value judgment. Many things in life give an advantage if you're willing to poor more money into them. Golf, many types of animal and vehicle racing, hell even swimming (there were some great articles during Phelps run about new swimsuits) provide a meaningful advantage to those with more cash.

2) Yes, some people will be "driven-away" by micro-transactions. However, some people with more money than time might be encouraged because they can now translate some of their real-world wealth into the game.

MMO players often seem to think that time is the only "fair" means with which reward folks. I don't think that's very fair. Some folks don't have as much time to put into the game. Were I not a busy manager and professional with a wife and two boys I probably would have many more of the game's rewards (I do OK now though).

[/ QUOTE ]

I think this cuts right to the heart of why I dislike this idea so much.

Money is such a huge advantage in the real world. If you are rich, you have more opportunities and options than someone who is poor. Like you said, in so many things in life more money is already an advantage.

I don't want to see CoH turn into one of those things. I LOVE the fact that real-world money can't buy you an advantage in this game (at least not officially, or legally). Let's keep the real world and the virtual world separate.

And if we do this, where do we draw the line? Why not just go all the way and let us buy inf with real money? Or why not let us buy levels? Or how about vet rewards?

That's my question to those of you who've argued in favor of this because we already have things that give us tangible in game benefits. If we're going to use that argument to justify why it's okay to let us buy IOs too, where should the line be drawn? And I don't mean that sarcastically at all, I'd really like to hear your answer.

This isn't a bad suggestion, but I'm not sure it's really necessary.

I'm not really sure how you mean just taking swift/hurdle is borking your build. Most characters take stamina anyway, so they'd be taking one of the two, plus health and stamina, for a total of 4 powers. If they took this travel power instead, and still took stamina, it would be either hook or quicken, plus advanced movement, plus either swift or hurdle, health, and stamina, for a total of 5 powers. I guess if the base movement rate for advanced movement were higher you might save a slot or two, but that's a pretty slim reason for a whole new power pool.

The farming comment wasn't necessarily directed at the OP. It's been brought up in this thread though.

And removing the AE building from Atlas WOULD restrict characters from using the AE as an alternate path from 1-50. Notice I didn't say prevent, I said restrict. As in it would restrict them to only being able to use it if they went to galaxy, or another zone other than Atlas Park.

I should have made it clearer that I wasn't really responding to the OP. His suggestion isn't all that bad. I'd be just as happy if the AE guy, and admissions officer lenk, and all the other random contacts that you only really need to do once didn't contact you at all.

No to both questions.

Another suggestion would be to drop your travel power.

/unsigned.

The intention behind the mission architect is for any character to use it as an alternate leveling path from 1-50. Anything that restricts the ability to do so is a bad idea. And yes, it's still a bad idea even if you think it will reduce farming.

[ QUOTE ]

As I said above, micro-transactions already provide tangible benefits to the PvE game; we're only arguing about the degree that micro-transactions should be allowed to cross the line.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'll try to use a little bit of symbolism to explain my feelings on this. Picture a quiet suburban home. The house is the point where microtransactions have no effect at all on gameplay, they're pure fluff. The property line is "the line" where microtransactions have too much of an effect on gameplay. So things like costume options, the super tailor and the like are all firmly inside the home. The jump pack, mission teleporter, and Pocket D VIP pass are like sitting on your front porch in the summer, watching the sun go down and drinking a beer. Still pretty close to the house. Self Destruct and mystic fortune are equivalent to going out to your mailbox and picking up your mail. Getting close to the line, but haven't crossed it yet. Keeping this in mind, allowing IOs to be purchased through microtransactions would be like walking down to the nearest bus stop, catching a bus bound for the local airport, hopping on a flight headed for sunny Orlando Florida, buying tickets to a tour of Kennedy Space Center, hijacking a Saturn V, and flying it to the moon.

IO's are simply too powerful to give out for money. Try a little exercise and you'll see what I mean. Take a scrapper at level 50, armed with SOs and all the temp powers you can purchase through microtransactions, and go solo a rikti pylon for me, or a couple AVs at once. Then IO out the same character and go try again.

See the difference?

Absolutely, 100%, could not say it more strongly, NO!

This is a terrible idea.

I'm very much against the idea of microtransactions in the first place. The only saving grace of them at the moment is that they're ignorable, since they have pretty much no effect on gameplay. This would change that.

Samson,

The devs have explicitly stated they don't want people farming AE missions. Why would they make an option to make it easier to do so?

This seems like a solution in search of a problem.

/unsigned.

The intention behind the mission architect is for any character to use it as an alternate leveling path from 1-50. Anything that restricts the ability to do so is a bad idea. And yes, it's still a bad idea even if you think it will reduce farming.

The highest I ever re-rolled a character was 28. My fire/WP became a fire/SR.

Everytime this comes up, I just think how lucky I am that my wife plays CoH too.