One of the major points of the OP seems to be that Stalkers can survive battles by running away from them, but this ability is hardly exclusive to Stalkers. EVERYONE can run. It just so happens that the central strategy of the Stalker is hit-and-run tactics, but everyone is capable of using this strategy.
Stalkers are definitely the natural selection process of CoH. I spend a lot of time in Siren's Call. Last night, I saw a Defender just standing out in the open, all alone, so I AS'd him to death. A few minutes later, I spot the exact same Defender, standing all by himself. Once again, I AS him. A few minutes later, I see the same Defender again. This time he's keeping moving and running Repel.
Because of my repeated killing, this guy learned the basics of how to survive in a PvP zone. Needless to say, I was very proud. 
"She started dancin' to that fine, fine music,
Y'know, her life was saved by rock 'n' roll."
--The Velvet Underground
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We've all seen a lot of back and forth in the PvP boards about Stalkers. We've seen complaints in the Stalker threads about needing improvement...I've noticed you seem very receptive to the idea that Stalkers might not be good enough. There's no point in debating about overpowered vs underpowered because it is largely a subjective discussion and offers little clarity.
One thing I think that has to be put on the table is that it would seem improbable for the devs to 100% nail the "balance" of the Stalker AT in PvP right out the gate nor would I expect them too. I realize there was internal testing and beta testing, but I do not believe the devs would contend that the data was conclusive or complete under those circumstances.
However, I am intereted in the devs providing the player base with a statement about how they perceive the risk vs reward for stalkers in PvP.
1) When the Arena first came out, Positron said he wasn't overly concerned with the 1v1 battles because it was too much of a rock/papers/scissors affair. How do we reconcile the dev philosophy that 1v1 can't be balanced and yet make sense of a toon that is designed for 1v1 combat? How does one side-step 1v1 balance on one hand and then appropriately balance an entire AT for it on another?
2) The Arena is a situation where neither toon can leave the battle. Players, blasters in particular, were using Phase Shift to effectively gank and escape and the devs put a stop to it. Clearly ganking was not to be tolerated. What is interesting is that the Stalker AT is predicated on ganking. Its speciality is the 1v1 battle with the escape. Why take that ability away from blasters in consensual battles but promote and endorse it in another AT in non-consensual battles?
3) I am unaware of any AT power that doesn't have some counter in another AT without resorting to power pools. Defender buffs are unresistable, but yet people can buff themseves beyond those debuffs a la Fort, Build-Up, etc. Blasters have some unresistable damage, but the majority of it is resistable. Every status power has some opposing power that resists it. Fear, Holds, Sleep, even Slows, have their counters within the players very powers themselves. Even Taunt in PvP is not 100%. And yet, nothing resists Placate. Yes, I understand you can knock someone out of it...provding you somehow manage to trigger an attack that launched before Placate takes affect and hits after (you can't honestly say this is an expected skill). Or, you can launch a PBAoE and hope to hit, provided you have one. But this isn't resistance to the statusing power like every other status power has. Are there plans to offer the other sets resistance to Placate e.g. Give Clear Mind, Integration, Practiced Brawler, Ind Will, etc?
(Btw, Assault offers no usable protection against Placate. Don't know if it is a bug, but I stood there and let one placate me...and I was not able to target them at all...and certainly not within the time for them to launch an AS after running around for a few seconds...and no...Assault wasn't detoggled).
3) It seems that the AT's in CoH have their foils in CoV. And vice versa. Who is the foil for a Stalker? Who can consistently solo defeat Stalkers who do not want to be defeated to the same extent that they can defeat any solo AT that doesn't want to be defeated? ...I'm reading that Stalkers can one-shot tanks in BB and Siren's with enough Rages. No solo AT can achieve the invisilibty of Stalkers, so should Stalkers be the only set that doesn't have to constantly be looking over its shoulder for fear of some hero?
Again, my question is not about is this too much or not enough, but how you and the devs perceive the balance and most importantly, how the off-setting weaknesses are actually substantive. What do I mean by that? Geko stated that one of the reasons that they turned IH back into a click is that they could not balance it as a toggle. They had meant for it to have a great healing benefit, and thought the huge endurance drain would compensate. But players proved they could avoid this penalty by six slotting QR and Stamina. So the penalty, though substantial...was not substantive. The same thing was said about Perma-Unstoppable. People were compensating for the crash, so there was not substantive penalty. It existed on paper, but was easily compensated for in-game. People talk about toons with damaging auras are proof against Hide...but I recall you explicity saying you were able to crit a Fire Brute...through BA and defeat him.
I think it would help a lot of the players if you explain how the devs perceive the AT is balanced in PvP and how that actually plays out in PvP...not how it plays out theoritically.
For all the Pro-Stalkers posters out there. I like Stalkers. I like the element that the AT brings to CoH. The joy in defeating them is almost as enjoyable as beating blasters. I also have defeated Stalkers with my Scrappers 1v1, so I'm not even protending that Stalkers are invincible. My lvl 33 has defeated a lvl 40 Stalker in Warburg...several times. But each and every defeat of a stalker was only a result:
1) they simply chose not to use enough Rages to one shot me.
2) They stuck around for the fight.
and usually,
3) I was playing a /regen
In absolutely none of those situations could I have defeated the Stalker if they had decided to check out early. And ...I was defeated far more times by Stalkers that stuck around than I defeated. So it wasn't like I sailed to victory. I'm not asking for any changes. I'm asking for an understanding from the devs for how this AT fits within the context of PvP from a substantive Risk vs Reward model.
I don't believe for a second that it is an easy task to balance this type of AT for PvP, so I'm certainly not recusing the devs even one bit, I am trying to understand it from their perspective.
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You do not understand PvP nor the class structure of CoH/V and apparently don't read between the lines well regarding the Arena.
Let me explain.
First off, comparing the current PvP to 1v1 Arena fights is much like comparing your Match Box car that you play zoom-zoom with, to my formula-1 racer that I won the Indy 500 with. The Arena was essentially Cryptic's way of testing out PvP. That's where your logic takes a large skew. That's how you got such changes as the Phase Shift change you mentioned. The difference between Phase Shift and Hide, is that Phase Shift couldn't be broken, while Hide can be.
CoH/V in general (and PvP is no different here) is balanced as a group game. You essentially have no choice in a game where multiple people with different power sets can interact. PvP is no different here. Now I can't speak for the devs, but the logical answer to your question would be that each class is balanced versus a set of criteria based upon current power sets, enchancement options and orientation within the game. To be really clear about this .... PvP in CoH is not balanced 1v1. If you want a 1v1 tailored PvP game, you need to find a different game.
As for your details .... Stalkers aren't any different from any other front loaded damage class. In fact, you may say that they are typical of them. However as far as inspirations go, I agree with you. However this isn't a Stalker issue, it's an inspiration issue. Having stackable buffs that are the same with no realistic cap is flat out silly and unbalancing. This is another area of the game that will be changed (I honestly can't believe it hasn't been already).
Finally, while everyone bases their opinion on their experiences, there's a certain flaw in judging a whole AT upon your experiences of fighting them for a few minutes/hours. Much like I wouldn't say baseball is a horrible sport, because I personally happen to be bad at it (although there will be people who will say that), please don't judge a whole AT because you happen to have difficulties against them (or in this case, a single person in particular).
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One of the major points of the OP seems to be that Stalkers can survive battles by running away from them, but this ability is hardly exclusive to Stalkers. EVERYONE can run. It just so happens that the central strategy of the Stalker is hit-and-run tactics, but everyone is capable of using this strategy.
Stalkers are definitely the natural selection process of CoH. I spend a lot of time in Siren's Call. Last night, I saw a Defender just standing out in the open, all alone, so I AS'd him to death. A few minutes later, I spot the exact same Defender, standing all by himself. Once again, I AS him. A few minutes later, I see the same Defender again. This time he's keeping moving and running Repel.
Because of my repeated killing, this guy learned the basics of how to survive in a PvP zone. Needless to say, I was very proud.
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Its natural selection. We cull the weak and useless from the PvP herd and in doing so, the herd becomes stronger.
Heroes should be thanking us, we're making them stronger.
"Through Avarice evil smiles; through insanity it sings"
Forum Troll Rule #1: Anyone who disagrees with my point of view is either a fanboy or an idiot.
I'm a proud carebear.
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Or does your -valueless- post indicate acceptance with everything aforementioned, excepting of course that most trivial sentence?
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Not really, i just didnt think it was worth commenting on because Castle has already stated that they are changing the coding in game so that any PvP attack that would kill a player in one hit will instead leave them with 1hp. With that in mind almost the entirety of your post was better off ignored.
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Correction here. The 1hp threshhold is only one of the ideas being considered. We've still not determined exactly how we are going to deal with 'One Shot Kills' (and the final decision will almost certainly apply to both PVE and PVP -- so no more AV insta-kills.)
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Or does your -valueless- post indicate acceptance with everything aforementioned, excepting of course that most trivial sentence?
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Not really, i just didnt think it was worth commenting on because Castle has already stated that they are changing the coding in game so that any PvP attack that would kill a player in one hit will instead leave them with 1hp. With that in mind almost the entirety of your post was better off ignored.
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Correction here. The 1hp threshhold is only one of the ideas being considered. We've still not determined exactly how we are going to deal with 'One Shot Kills' (and the final decision will almost certainly apply to both PVE and PVP -- so no more AV insta-kills.)
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Are you saying players can't be insta killed, or mobs....
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Correction here. The 1hp threshhold is only one of the ideas being considered. We've still not determined exactly how we are going to deal with 'One Shot Kills' (and the final decision will almost certainly apply to both PVE and PVP -- so no more AV insta-kills.)
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Will this also mean no more players one-shotting mobs? Even blue or green or grey mobs? If so, that's going to be pretty annoying.
1 hp?? That is a horrid idea. As someone who plays mostly squishies, (Dunno why) going into PvP zones (on a team or alone) is really only fun maybe 25% of the time. Getting constantly one shotted (or ASd then hit with some small attack that finishes me off) before I can even do anything makes PVP a complete lack of fun. I'd vote for downing the damage AS does in PVP, since I know alot of people have been complaining about it (if not here, then in game at least.) What makes it even worse is the majority of people playing stalkers now in PVP zones are the oft-mentioned "jerkfaces" who think they're all "00bah supah r0xxorz!" and they detract from the fun of PVP even moreso.
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Correction here. The 1hp threshhold is only one of the ideas being considered. We've still not determined exactly how we are going to deal with 'One Shot Kills' (and the final decision will almost certainly apply to both PVE and PVP -- so no more AV insta-kills.)
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Will this also mean no more players one-shotting mobs? Even blue or green or grey mobs? If so, that's going to be pretty annoying.
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If it means that players can't get one-shotted by AVs anymore... I'm all for it.
Be well, people of CoH.
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1) When the Arena first came out, Positron said he wasn't overly concerned with the 1v1 battles because it was too much of a rock/papers/scissors affair. How do we reconcile the dev philosophy that 1v1 can't be balanced and yet make sense of a toon that is designed for 1v1 combat? How does one side-step 1v1 balance on one hand and then appropriately balance an entire AT for it on another?
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Stalkers were not explicitly designed for 1v1 combat. In fact, they are *most* effective in teams, where something else can distract the target long enough for the stalker to strike. They are *good* 1v1 fighters, but there is no evidence to support the contention they were "designed" for 1v1 combat, any more than scrappers were.
Brute/stalker is a perfect counterexample to the "stalkers are designed for 1v1 combat" contention.
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2) The Arena is a situation where neither toon can leave the battle. Players, blasters in particular, were using Phase Shift to effectively gank and escape and the devs put a stop to it. Clearly ganking was not to be tolerated. What is interesting is that the Stalker AT is predicated on ganking. Its speciality is the 1v1 battle with the escape. Why take that ability away from blasters in consensual battles but promote and endorse it in another AT in non-consensual battles?
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Escape works both ways: stalkers can escape, and their targets can escape.
Also, I'm not sure in what sense you are using the word "gank." You seem to use it to refer to the act of attacking and then retreating, but that is a highly non-standard use of the word. The most common MMO-usage is to refer to the act of killing an unsuspecting (and with no reason to suspect) target, or killing a target where the target was so inferior to you there was literally no hope for the target at all. A blaster killing a target and phase shifting isn't ganking: it was considered a cheap tactic by some, but it isn't ganking.
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3) It seems that the AT's in CoH have their foils in CoV. And vice versa. Who is the foil for a Stalker? Who can consistently solo defeat Stalkers who do not want to be defeated to the same extent that they can defeat any solo AT that doesn't want to be defeated? ...I'm reading that Stalkers can one-shot tanks in BB and Siren's with enough Rages. No solo AT can achieve the invisilibty of Stalkers, so should Stalkers be the only set that doesn't have to constantly be looking over its shoulder for fear of some hero?
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Go back to this statement in section one:
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When the Arena first came out, Positron said he wasn't overly concerned with the 1v1 battles because it was too much of a rock/papers/scissors affair.
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Lots of powers see through hide. Tactics, and especially overlapping tactics, sees through stacked stealth. Stalkers have a foil: high perception players, and especially high perception teams.
And stalkers need inspirations to one-shot, which is a limited quantity resource. Balanced against the fact that stealth can be penetrated by IR goggles, another limited quantity resource.
Stalker balancers:
1. Lower health
One balancer against the fact that stalkers do high alpha strike damage is that they themselves have relatively low health, meaning while they can one-shot and two-shot a lot of things, a lot of things can one-shot and two-shot them.
2. Lower damage output
Outside of AS, and hide/criticals, stalkers do much less damage than a lot of things. Outside of the alpha strike, stalkers have a difficult time keeping up damage against a target.
3. Lower defenses
Of all the melee classes, stalkers have the lowest net mitigation. They are, for all intents and purposes, borderline squishies. Scrappers, tank, and brutes all have higher mitigation. In fact, a lot of defenders probably have much higher net damage mitigation than stalkers.
4. Hide suppression
In teams hide suppression is a major problem, because after the alpha strike, the stalker, with low health and low mitigation, becomes a target for all surviving members of the opposing team, assuming for the sake of argument that the stalker optimally alpha-strike killed his target.
Can a stalker hit and run, to allow rehide and re-strike? Yes. But that option is available to other classes as well, such as blasters.
5. Assassin's strike has internal balancers
AS has long activation time, and its interruptible, and it only crits from hide. This means already that AS has some significant restrictions:
a. It is extremely difficult to use against fliers.
b. It is extremely difficult to use against jousters.
c. It is moderately tricky to use around AoE.
d. It is difficult to use around damage auras.
e. It is impossible to use around auto-hitting auras
f. It requires setup time outside of the intial alpha strike to establish hidden status: rehide or placate
6. Not all stalkers are the same, and each has weaknesses.
For example, ninjitsu has no KB protection. "Hit and run" is good on paper, but against anything wielding knockback, running might not be an option. Energy has no AoE defense to stack with hide, which means it is less protected against (non-autohitting) AoE auras, and AoE attacks.
Because of this, blanket statements about the class as a whole, as to what their preferred targets are, what advantages they have, and what tactics they are going to employ specifically, aren't likely to be true across all stalkers.
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In absolutely none of those situations could I have defeated the Stalker if they had decided to check out early. And ...I was defeated far more times by Stalkers that stuck around than I defeated.
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Those two statements are not proper reverses. The proper reverse statements for each are:
"In absolutely none of those situations could I have defeated the Stalker if they had decided to check out early."
Question: in any of those cases could they have defeated you if *you* elected to "check out early?"
"I was defeated far more times by Stalkers that stuck around than I defeated."
Question: does this mean that the advantage of stalkers has nothing to do with escape, hit-and-run, alpha strike, perception, or "ganking" as such?
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But each and every defeat of a stalker was only a result:
1) they simply chose not to use enough Rages to one shot me.
2) They stuck around for the fight.
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For every defeat, its possible to state that the only reason my opponent didn't defeat me is because they stayed to fight, and didn't use enough insps to overpower me. If I use more inspirations than you, and no one disengages, I kill you, regardless of what I play and what you play. Thats why they don't sell them in the PvP zones.
[Guide to Defense] [Scrapper Secondaries Comparison] [Archetype Popularity Analysis]
In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)
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Correction here. The 1hp threshhold is only one of the ideas being considered. We've still not determined exactly how we are going to deal with 'One Shot Kills' (and the final decision will almost certainly apply to both PVE and PVP -- so no more AV insta-kills.)
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Will this also mean no more players one-shotting mobs? Even blue or green or grey mobs? If so, that's going to be pretty annoying.
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I bet they mean only players being one-shotted, but that it will slip through for a few days so that players can't 1-shot any mob either. 
I asked for clarification on this when it was mentioned on the beta boards. The code will be for PLAYERS ONLY, meaning that a player will not be one-shotted by players OR by mobs. Players will still be able to one-shot mobs.
You're a brave man to post this question in the Stalker forum.
The real issue is one of damage over time.
In a 2 second fight, Stalkers outdamage Scrappers.
In a 5 minute fight, Scrappers outdamage Stalkers.
Stalker vs Scrapper is almost never fair, since PvP battles tend towards the 2 second range. The Scrapper's greater overall DPS doesn't pay off because there's no time.
So "one shotting" isn't the entire problem. The real problem is time based. If all fights last 2 seconds, Stalkers will always win. If all fights last 5 minutes, Scrappers will always win. Something needs to be adjusted so that battles last an amount of time that gives everyone a reasonable chance to participate. Even a Radiation Corruptor could do pretty good in PvP if fights lasted long enough for him to get in some heals. When an Ice/Energy Blaster melts him down in 2 shots, though, then his Radiation heals become useless.
In a world where fights last 2 seconds, Stalkers will always win.
If fixing this problem means we need to buff the Stalker in other ways then that's absolutely fine. If Stalkers require longer to kill people, then give them more resistances to compensate. Or more hit points. Whatever.
The point isn't to "nerf Stalkers", the point is to allow everyone to have fun in PvP and not just burst damage powersets.
I'm sorry, but to me, that's an insane way to do it, and it just means good Healing Defenders will be able to exploit this in game for both PvP and PvE content. Hell, I play an SR scrapper as my main so I'm as prone to one shots as anyone, but to artificially introduce a game mechanic because some whiners and supposedly 'l33t' PvPers hate the fact that sometimes one-shots happen (and I dislike PvP so it's not like I care what the CoV ATs can do); and don't think it's 'fair'.
Sheesh, what's next? A confirmation box where a PvE MOB needs to have your consent before dropping yuou to zero HP?
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I asked for clarification on this when it was mentioned on the beta boards. The code will be for PLAYERS ONLY, meaning that a player will not be one-shotted by players OR by mobs. Players will still be able to one-shot mobs.
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That's the basic idea, yes. It would be pretty annoying for a level 50 scrapper to hit a level 1 Hellion and not take him down instantly.
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Or does your -valueless- post indicate acceptance with everything aforementioned, excepting of course that most trivial sentence?
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Not really, i just didnt think it was worth commenting on because Castle has already stated that they are changing the coding in game so that any PvP attack that would kill a player in one hit will instead leave them with 1hp. With that in mind almost the entirety of your post was better off ignored.
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Correction here. The 1hp threshhold is only one of the ideas being considered. We've still not determined exactly how we are going to deal with 'One Shot Kills' (and the final decision will almost certainly apply to both PVE and PVP -- so no more AV insta-kills.)
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Eliminating AV insta kills (if that's even remotely possible) I wouldn't have a problem with.
But Minion instant kills? LT instant kills? Taking that away I do have a problem with. One-shot kills on opponents like these are completely within the capabilities of other ATs. Scrapper criticals. Blaster Aim/BU/Snipes. My EM Tanker can one-shot kill an even level LT with Energy Transfer and Build Up. In that light, given the set up it requires, there's no way it's fair for a Stalker AS to not be able to kill off "little" foes like these.
Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater here. One shot kills with something called assassination strike should be the norm, not the exception. Otherwise it's not an assasination strike.
Either keep the PvP solution separate or make there be some sort of threshold for it to kick in.
EDIT: You beat me to this post with an answer. Thanks!
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
Great post, Arcanaville.
"She started dancin' to that fine, fine music,
Y'know, her life was saved by rock 'n' roll."
--The Velvet Underground
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I'm sorry, but to me, that's an insane way to do it, and it just means good Healing Defenders will be able to exploit this in game for both PvP and PvE content.
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If you mean because they can outheal damage, then it's time for Stalkers to take their own advice:
Group.
PvP is not balanced for 1v1. If changes occur that allow a solo Defender to outheal you, then group up. Nobody can outheal a double assassinate.
Nobody (not even me) is proposing that people be completely immune from insta-death, but we ARE proposing that it at least require a group to do it. If you want to get 3 Stalkers to simultaniously attack a Tanker and kill him instantly, then more power to you.
The time of Stalker solo domination needs to end. Stalkers have been saying "you need to group" far too long while completely avoiding the need to group up themselves.
Take your own pill. Group up.
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That's the basic idea, yes. It would be pretty annoying for a level 50 scrapper to hit a level 1 Hellion and not take him down instantly.
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That brings up an intesting topic for discussion: How do you define a one-shot? Is it something can take you from full health to less than zero in a single attack? Theoretically, if you are one point away from full health, that could be seen as a "second shot." Probably some range would need to be set up (you have 90% or more of your possible HP at the time) to protect you.. hmm.
If that is the case, are we going to see blasters hp brought back down to a more reasonable level for pvp purposes?
Or raising MM's hp up to reasonable levels? :P
And people complain about the stupidity of doing the hotspotsin Sirens Call cause of debt now...
Bah! Let stalkers have their due....
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We've all seen a lot of back and forth in the PvP boards about Stalkers. We've seen complaints in the Stalker threads about needing improvement...I've noticed you seem very receptive to the idea that Stalkers might not be good enough. There's no point in debating about overpowered vs underpowered because it is largely a subjective discussion and offers little clarity.
One thing I think that has to be put on the table is that it would seem improbable for the devs to 100% nail the "balance" of the Stalker AT in PvP right out the gate nor would I expect them too. I realize there was internal testing and beta testing, but I do not believe the devs would contend that the data was conclusive or complete under those circumstances.
However, I am intereted in the devs providing the player base with a statement about how they perceive the risk vs reward for stalkers in PvP.
1) When the Arena first came out, Positron said he wasn't overly concerned with the 1v1 battles because it was too much of a rock/papers/scissors affair. How do we reconcile the dev philosophy that 1v1 can't be balanced and yet make sense of a toon that is designed for 1v1 combat? How does one side-step 1v1 balance on one hand and then appropriately balance an entire AT for it on another?
2) The Arena is a situation where neither toon can leave the battle. Players, blasters in particular, were using Phase Shift to effectively gank and escape and the devs put a stop to it. Clearly ganking was not to be tolerated. What is interesting is that the Stalker AT is predicated on ganking. Its speciality is the 1v1 battle with the escape. Why take that ability away from blasters in consensual battles but promote and endorse it in another AT in non-consensual battles?
3) I am unaware of any AT power that doesn't have some counter in another AT without resorting to power pools. Defender buffs are unresistable, but yet people can buff themseves beyond those debuffs a la Fort, Build-Up, etc. Blasters have some unresistable damage, but the majority of it is resistable. Every status power has some opposing power that resists it. Fear, Holds, Sleep, even Slows, have their counters within the players very powers themselves. Even Taunt in PvP is not 100%. And yet, nothing resists Placate. Yes, I understand you can knock someone out of it...provding you somehow manage to trigger an attack that launched before Placate takes affect and hits after (you can't honestly say this is an expected skill). Or, you can launch a PBAoE and hope to hit, provided you have one. But this isn't resistance to the statusing power like every other status power has. Are there plans to offer the other sets resistance to Placate e.g. Give Clear Mind, Integration, Practiced Brawler, Ind Will, etc?
(Btw, Assault offers no usable protection against Placate. Don't know if it is a bug, but I stood there and let one placate me...and I was not able to target them at all...and certainly not within the time for them to launch an AS after running around for a few seconds...and no...Assault wasn't detoggled).
3) It seems that the AT's in CoH have their foils in CoV. And vice versa. Who is the foil for a Stalker? Who can consistently solo defeat Stalkers who do not want to be defeated to the same extent that they can defeat any solo AT that doesn't want to be defeated? ...I'm reading that Stalkers can one-shot tanks in BB and Siren's with enough Rages. No solo AT can achieve the invisilibty of Stalkers, so should Stalkers be the only set that doesn't have to constantly be looking over its shoulder for fear of some hero?
Again, my question is not about is this too much or not enough, but how you and the devs perceive the balance and most importantly, how the off-setting weaknesses are actually substantive. What do I mean by that? Geko stated that one of the reasons that they turned IH back into a click is that they could not balance it as a toggle. They had meant for it to have a great healing benefit, and thought the huge endurance drain would compensate. But players proved they could avoid this penalty by six slotting QR and Stamina. So the penalty, though substantial...was not substantive. The same thing was said about Perma-Unstoppable. People were compensating for the crash, so there was not substantive penalty. It existed on paper, but was easily compensated for in-game. People talk about toons with damaging auras are proof against Hide...but I recall you explicity saying you were able to crit a Fire Brute...through BA and defeat him.
I think it would help a lot of the players if you explain how the devs perceive the AT is balanced in PvP and how that actually plays out in PvP...not how it plays out theoritically.
For all the Pro-Stalkers posters out there. I like Stalkers. I like the element that the AT brings to CoH. The joy in defeating them is almost as enjoyable as beating blasters. I also have defeated Stalkers with my Scrappers 1v1, so I'm not even protending that Stalkers are invincible. My lvl 33 has defeated a lvl 40 Stalker in Warburg...several times. But each and every defeat of a stalker was only a result:
1) they simply chose not to use enough Rages to one shot me.
2) They stuck around for the fight.
and usually,
3) I was playing a /regen
In absolutely none of those situations could I have defeated the Stalker if they had decided to check out early. And ...I was defeated far more times by Stalkers that stuck around than I defeated. So it wasn't like I sailed to victory. I'm not asking for any changes. I'm asking for an understanding from the devs for how this AT fits within the context of PvP from a substantive Risk vs Reward model.
I don't believe for a second that it is an easy task to balance this type of AT for PvP, so I'm certainly not recusing the devs even one bit, I am trying to understand it from their perspective.
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A lively discussion, but the Op is pretty far off base-due ot lack of information, and evidently lack of actually playing a stalker. To answer the numbered items:
1) In every game, there are always toons that are better solo, and others better in group. Just because the devs dont want to design for 1v1 battles doestn mean they wont occur and that some builds won't be better at it.
2) Theres a logic flaw here. Ganking was eliminated from pool powers becuase you cant balance ALL Ats against the ability. Any AT coudl gank with the old PS. You can however balance for one At to have ganking. Almost every game out there has had this type of class. This is nothing new.
3) Incorrect again. I am knocked out of placate all the time. Any attack from another source will do it. Aoe adn non-targeted attacks will do it (caltrops, rains, PBAE auras). This is patently untrue.
4) There a plenty of Foils for the Stalker. you must not play one or you would know. Tanks and scraps who are too tough to be taken down fast. Anyone with auras that foil your AS. Storm trollers and Defenders are particularly annoying. ANyone with +perception powers. I would argue in fact the opposite of the OP! Stalkers are substandard in all departments if they cant get off their AS, And every good group out there has them wired and neutered already. hurricane, Stacked acc/perception auras. its sucks. A few weeks into the game and i'm already depressed that all I can do is gank a couple strays I find in a few hours of play, while my heroes were useful full time in every battle.
Believe me,your experiences to date are only because you must be new to PVP. ANyone who has been out there fighting has already nerfed the one trick pony that are stalkers....
My 27 stalker has quite a few types of tanks that he can not get close nuff to stab without taking damage from aoe auroras. In short, if i cant stab them, I cant beat them.
If they nerf stalkers then they need to really nerf blaster. I've been 2 shoted by many a build up + aim blasters. If there is no more one or 2 shoting then scrappers and blaster will have to be rexamined as well.
I agree. I spend so much time just following my targets around waiting for them to stand still for a split second, and when I do catch up with them I often blow the kill because I missed my AS or they reacted with a tray full of greens before I could fire off another attack. A Blaster or a Scrapper can just find an opponent and engage, but a Stalker has to be very patient and careful. Miss that initial AS and you may as well start running, because you don't have the offense to make up for that damage and you don't have the hit points or defenses to even consider trying.