seebs
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Posts
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I've been having a blast with demons/dark. The heal is pretty amazing just because it's so MUCH healing and AoE (though the radius is tiny). The to-hit debuffs really help make up for demons being sorta squishy.
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I picked up a lot of my terminology elsewhere.
Anyway, it varies a lot. On my bots MM, defensive/follow, run in, drop PGT or caltrops. Usually that's all I have to do. The tricky part comes when, say, one group is too close to another for my comfort -- then I usually pick an outrunner, have the bots attack it, immediately hit follow, and run around a corner.
On the demons/dark mm, if there's anything I can easily pick off, and I'm not in a hurry, I tend to grab something with TP foe. If a group is reasonably isolated, I can just charge in and attack. If there's other groups nearby, I try to encourage them to come towards me and away from whatever else is nearby. I will happily open with some kind of ranged attack and hop around a corner -- that's why my tentative plan includes the long-range whip attack. Corners are nice for getting everyone bunched up around my darkest night anchor on a tar patch.
In general, if I don't feel the need to specially move the mobs away from where they spawned, I pretty much come up to them and attack. Since I have Shadow Fall up, that usually means I come pretty close and then attack. They all initially attack me, then the demons kill them. I laugh maniacally. -
Quote:My problem has been that one or another of the demons gets too much aggro and is in danger of dying. If I can pull the aggro off that demon briefly, all is usually well. I'm not viewing it as a full-time tanking tool, just an interruption in the normal chaos.Originally Posted by _Klaw_
Then you don't need provoke.
Just walk up to a group and you will get the alpha or better yet use your attack or drop a tarpatch. Provoke is supposed to be used to keep the aggro on yourself all the time.
I don't think the radius on TG is much over ten feet, I just spend some of my time running around to get centered among the demons. -
Quote:I dunno. If I were to take my bots/traps MM, and then remove three powers from her in exchange for more blue, I might well recommend that.Originally Posted by Alkirin
You can do without it. But you'll never regret taking it.
The tradeoff is that if you don't take Stamina, you can't use all of your powers -- but you have more powers to pick from. If you take Stamina, you can probably use all of your remaining powers, but you can spam them more. -
Quote:I've only done one mish with it, but I've been loving it. I'm seeing a much more even spread of damage over me and the pets, rather than one demonling ending up badly hurt and the rest of us untouched. I don't expect to KEEP things on me, just get them on me long enough to break up some of the initial damage.Originally Posted by _Klaw_
Provoke is really meh for mm's. It is very weak by itself because the pets attacks reduce it's taunt time severly. It can add taunt on top of your own attacks but I don't think it's worth the slot.
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Quote:Might be worth a try.Originally Posted by OneWhoBinds
Some thoughts:
A lot of people have chimed in that Crack Whip is all the Taunt they need. You may be able to get by without Provoke, if you take that.
On my dark/ defender, I've found that PG is pretty useful because with only a couple of rech/hold enhancements, it starts being pretty easy to keep it stacked. Also, very nice to be able to remove the one thing I really don't want to fight from a pull.Quote:Petrifying Gaze is a so-so power. If, when you add slots, you can't find enough to really lock an enemy down for a long time... skip it. It is the only other Dark Miasma power I could recommend avoiding. Remember, both the Servant and the Demon Prince are going to have single target holds too...
I'm usually hitting three of the four as long as they haven't run into melee. Well, five, now.Quote:Don't make the mistake of thinking Dark Miasma for MM is the same as Dark Miasma is for other ATs. Most notably, Twilight Grasp is a much different, weaker thing on MM. With only a ten foot radius around you for the heal, you will be LUCKY if you can hit two of your pets with it. It still heals for a lot, but you aren't going to be seeing Green numbers over all your pets with this power. So keep that in mind.
Yeah, that's on my Wouldn't It Be Nice list. Coupled with shadow fall and Stay, it could let me get to new places and then pick up my little friends.Quote:On a personal note, you may get more mileage out of Recall Friend than Teleport Foe. It's useful for bringing your pets to you, especially when they encounter some piece of geometry that confuses them. -
Okay, here's an example attempt at making this work. I just wrote off Fitness. Unenhanced, the stamina drain of all toggles is 2.6 end/sec, but obviously enhanced it'll be quite a bit lower. Haven't even really looked at enhancements or sets, just trying to get a feel for where the powers come in.
Answers to questions:
* Teleport because it fits the character conceptually.
* Didn't take the whip until late because everything before that seemed more important. I may have been wrong.
* Didn't have enough slots for a second (or third) whip power; I went for the longest range.
* Hover because it makes teleporting a lot easier/safer.
* Taunt because bodyguard mode and an AoE heal work really well IF I can cause things to attack me instead of my scrawny little demonlings.
* Tactics because the demonlings are two levels below me and have a really hard time hitting even slotted for accuracy. (And +to-hit is multiplied by accuracy, so once they're around 60-70% accuracy, +to-hit becomes quite valuable to them.)
Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.803
http://www.cohplanner.com/
Click this DataLink to open the build!
Charlene White: Level 48 Natural Mastermind
Primary Power Set: Demon Summoning
Secondary Power Set: Dark Miasma
Power Pool: Teleportation
Power Pool: Flight
Power Pool: Presence
Power Pool: Leadership
Ancillary Pool: Soul Mastery
Villain Profile:
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Level 1: Brawl- (A) Empty
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Level 6: Ninja Run
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So, here's the thing. I really like teleport. It's a good fit for my character concept. I really like leadership on MMs just because there's so many pets to get the bonuses. I have been told that Provoke is really useful for keeping pets alive a bit longer -- especially since as a /dark, I have an AoE heal, so spreading damage out is awesome. And at least a couple of people have told me not to skip all the whip powers, because a -res debuff is useful. Oh, and some people recommend hover if you're going to use teleport to travel. Everything in /dark is good except Black Hole...
So I can pretty much get all the powers I really need by about 60, assuming I don't do a PPP/APP.
Heeeeelp. -
I think it depends on your build. My bots/traps hasn't got it and doesn't miss it; my DS/Dark is feeling the lack a little.
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I'm torn on the advantage-for-spending-money thing. Some of the enhancements give stuff I'm not using much (self destruct), others give stuff that's pretty much a gigantic advantage.
I think the intent is that they're optional, but useful. Yes, that is a sinister scheme to get money from us. I think, though, that the extra benefit is something people can live okay without, so it's not as bad as it might be. It's not as though people are saying "LFM ITF, must have Ninja Run." -
To some extent, it depends on the team. So the question I'd ask is: Which AT is most useful to a team which doesn't already have one.
My experience has been that defenders, in general, are among the most likely to radically alter the experience of play for other team members. Any given specific DPS can probably be replaced, although they're always useful. Tankers can be pretty optional if you have good control or defenders.
For something that isn't great at low levels but is amazing at 20+, look into traps. Dark miasma also works pretty well. Note that you can do most of the same things on corruptor, MM, or troller, depending on set -- but defenders tend to get the best versions of the buff set powers. Trollers can provide backup defender abilities while locking enemies down, always nice.
A lot of it comes down to what you enjoy playing. I've gotten more benefit from an enthusiastic scrapper than from a bored defender. -
Quote:Some are that way. Others are the other way. I've seen both.Originally Posted by SkarmoryThePG
I'd like to point something out.
At least in Praetoria, ambushes ALREADY don't aggro on a stealthed stalker. They run to where they were triggered, then stand there if they can't see you. -
I seem to recall that there's a day job which gives a mission completion XP bonus, with which just clearing missions can be very effective.
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Quote:I'd say that might not be quite fair. I would say that if you break LoS, but someone can get to where you were and get LoS again, you might not be hidden.Originally Posted by Beelzy
Check, are we all in agreement on the following points?
1) once you break LoS, you should be hidden
Possibly a rule similar to the LoS rule. A player-targeted ambush can run to where you were. If when they get there you're in LoS, they have a chance. If you're not in LoS from there, they don't know what happened.Quote:2) aggro should not break hidden
I wouldn't mind too much if AS were just a bit more durable in the face of, say, things running around and pushing.Quote:3) AS and Placate need to have shorter cast times
Not sure it's really needed. Wouldn't hurt, but it seems a bit more buff than is called for.Quote:4) a -regen proc needs to be added to AS (to allow both burst damage and AV killing capabilities)
That seems ridiculous to me. It's a snipe. Sure, it's a melee snipe, but it's a snipe; interruptible is part of this.Quote:3) removing interrupt time from AS
What you've described would be unreasonably overpowered IMHO. -
That seems crazy. I can at least understand it in actual blue/red content, but in Praetoria, it's not even coherent.
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I've seen him heal a fair bit. I'm demons/dark, and occasionally he heals the little ones when I don't have time. I dunno, though, I probably won't specifically enhance it, he's got too much other functionality.
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Except we don't see the same damage done to everyone, because some people have more resistance than others.
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Quote:Chained player-targeted ambushes are pretty sucky.Originally Posted by Zem
What soloing trouble? Soloing is arguably what Stalkers are best at.
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Quote:No, it means we'll see more super heroes -- some of whom are a bit atypical.Originally Posted by BrandX
But adding more options, imo, to create less typical Super Hero, is just going to mean we see less Super Heroes, in a Super Hero game that already has A LOT of non-super hero ideas running around.
Why shouldn't that be a super hero?Quote:So, why not make more SUPER HERO (and Villain) options, before more of the "Look I made my bear gut, battle axe wielding drawf barbarian from our LOTR games" options?
Super heroes are defined by their actions, not by how "typical" they are. -
Here's a thought for a mechanic:
If I drop out of LoS of a mob, it will try to get to where it saw me last.
If when it gets there I am not in LoS, and I am hidden, it loses me.
So you can't lose a mob just by running around a corner, but a second corner is enough to "lose" it -- it can no longer figure out where you are.
Basically, if I run around two corners before the thing chasing me makes it around the first corner, and I've gotten into "Hidden", it should lose me. It might keep moving around, but it should no longer have the automatic ability to target me and attack me. I hid.
I think that would pretty much deal with 90% of the soloing trouble stalkers have. -
When they're done fixing underpowered sets like Kinetics, maybe they can work on the unstoppable, massively-overpowered, Trick Arrow set. Or possibly do something about the pet AI for masterminds, because it's really embarassing that our pets are obviously smarter than we are. Oh, and they should make it easier for redside players to find their first arachnos base, because currently the base in the starting area is essentially impossible to find.
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My only complaint, really, is that a LOT of outfits and hair and such clip badly with Ninja Run.
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I'm loving the morality missions. Sure, the individual missions are mostly pretty straightforward... but...
1. "mostly". I've had a few that were more interesting one way or another. The rogue morality mission was a blast for me.
2. The choices they make seem to genuinely fit character personalities. The characters I think of as heroes really do prefer the hero choices to the vigilante choices, and vice versa.
3. The more I play Praetoria, the more impressed I am by many aspects of the writing. The story lines are, IMHO, well done. The morality choices, again, strike me as giving some latitude for interesting roleplaying.
4. There's a ton of interesting stuff floating around. The graffiti sometimes says stuff. The plots connect to each other.
5. New power sets! AWESOME power sets! I'm not even using all of them yet, but KM has made stalker fun to me, DP is nice and thematic, and DS is being a blast.
Basically, I'm having a blast. Sure, I've seen larger expansions in the past, but this one's big enough to give me a ton of interesting enjoyment value. I'm overjoyed with the morality changing mechanic. I once spent about five years trying to convince an MMO company that some people might want the ability to opt out of a nonexistent and boring war. I gave up. Now I can opt out when I want to, and my unstoppable robot army can work for the highest bidder without regard to tedious politics.
So I'm really happy. The mechanics and storytelling aren't quite up to, say, a D&D game written by a serious professional writer, but it's a ton of fun, and I'm getting to group with people and run around doing stuff. So I'm happy. Especially given the free month of play included with the box.
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I've found it pretty frustrating playing dual MMs. I'd actually sort of suggest doing MM/something-else. If you both want to play MMs, each of you can have a something-else to play with the other's MM.
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I have a dark/dark defender who LOVES hover. Surprisingly good mitigation against many melee types, can hold interesting procs and IOs, and very helpful when trying to figure out what's up on that catwalk, etc. (Especially with shadow fall giving stealth...)