Official Thread for Recluses Victory: PvP Zone
By
Adam7,
Posted on: 2006-05-01 24:15 in Developers' Corner
If yesterday was the Elec/Elec and Gang MMs show then today was definitely Return of the Heroes.
All the Ice Tanks out there almost made the /Elec Brutes envious by comparison.
Last I checked at 12:30 Central time there were SIXTEEN instanced RVs. Nice tally.
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Stone brutes... "Why won't anybody play with me?"
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ROFL
ran into a stone tanker and got on his nerves. He tp foe'd me into melee range. I sat there for about a minute or so letting him wail on me. I got bored, so I started healing myself and chaining heal/transferal/fulcrum shift/siphon/siphon speed. He got bored after a while, finally ended when another hero saw the comedy routine going on, and gave the tanker a much needed hand in killing me. The most annoying part of all of this? at no time did I manage to leave him out of energy from transferal, and not sure if my siphon speeds where even making a dent in his recharge rates.
Freakshow Raver: I love your knives. You know, you can use them on me later if ya want.
Knives of Artemis Raver: Right
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I don't know if this has been mentioned but the 1 hp hospital trip just slows things down. Its a real annoyance. Can't we have full health or at least half?
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/not signed, that delay that annoys you, makes the zone one where tactics matter, past waiting for a regrouping. Right now, you kill someone, and he wont be back for at least a minute or two, allowing you to do something. remove that delay, and local area wins become unlikely.
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Fair enough, but then it needs to be implemented in a more equitable fashion, since /Regens and self healing types can get back into the action with nary a delay while poor stupid schmucks like Dominators nearly spend more time in the hospital than out in the zone. Give people who die a stackable two minute 'rez sickness' debuff or something.
Gothika (Grav/Kin) Marionette (Ill/Rad) Terra Firma (Earth/Storm) Alana Dale (Arch/Nrg)
Iceblink (Ice/Dark) Fantasia (Mind/Fire) Shadow Minx (Claws/Nin)
--Virtue
From the RV event on test and playing there before, the Firebase/Pillbox guns are still way too strong IMO. Those babies can range kill any squishy with ease, and grant a ton of protection to anyone inside. I see the RP point and it is a good theme, but the dmg on them is SICK, especially when you can hit anyone you can tab with them via a simple attack command. Even if it is a challenge to get the Pillboxes, or to take them back, I think that they should be vastly toned down when someone actually is in one.
The same goes for all of the NPCs in the zone. I don't know if the devs were just feeling crazy or what, but just about every NPC in that zone can take off 1/4-1/3 of almost any squishy AT's hp. If you stick around to fight them you can prevail sure, but the Wardens are a sight to behold, and just running by any = a chunk of your hp is gone. Everyone is also still fond of utilizing the NPCs to whittle down an opponent, or just to grief the person for some debt. Again, they make sense, like with all the other zones; but I think the NPCs are too much to contend with on a regular basis in RV, especially if you have no mez protection or are out of insps. Go ask any Dom that wandered by a Warden or Spec Ops and they'll tell you how quickly they were stunned/killed.
Normally I'd be very upbeat about this interesting zone, but from RV on test, it's easy to see how everything is out of whack. Even if 4-1 situations, heroes still overcome villains with ease, and when EPP/APPs/PPPs come into play, we all know who has the better deal. Very few villains can reliably hit the hero +def sets, yet even WITHOUT Foccused Accuracy, heroes are able to bypass villain +def with ease. Since heroes have unresistable dmg in scrappers and blasters, vs. villains who only have AS as unresistable; the +res on villains isn't helping so much.
HP is the big thing that bothered me here, the disparity between hero and villain HP in this zone is a joke. If not the hp, then the dmg output of a blaster vs. ANY corrupter, MM or Dom that hasn't been massively buffed is a sight to behold. MMs, Cors and Doms do not have reliable mez protection, sure, 3 hero ATs do not as well, but conts do get IW in their epics, and emps, sonics, kins, rads are more popular on ther hero side, and can buff the mez right out of a person. The zone is interesting, but the NPCs and lack of balance between both sides makes it a lot less fun. Chuck in respawning at 1 hp as a villain while heroes have Longbow that spam AoE heals, and emps; and everything looks that much worse.
Spine Scrapper!!!! Arg!!!! 
I was getting hunted by them on 2 seprate instances!!! Jump in throw spines Imob run repeat
I kind of liked this event since i finaly had the chance to try out RV on the Villain side. tried a elct/elct brute, Thug/Dark and a Fire/Cold Corrupter. My fav was the corrupter Casting Snow storm on a hero then Sleet followed by Rain of fire was just too awesome. Thug/Dark if i could find any hero alone i would win.
the thing i dont like so far is the lack of Break Free's. Having a Energy meele super speed by and stun you ever time gets a little annoying. So RV is really easy for those who have a mezz power.
Some impressions of RV last night for a few hours:
The zone was great fun to be in. Taking a pillbox and watching the zoen change was a great feeling. Taking a pillbox with only the help of a heavy way really fun too. A few too many bosses wandering around for my tastes, but whatever. I probably wouldn't enter this area on Live until I hit 50. Too much possibility of people being lame and trying to purposefully give people debt.
The lack of breakfrees is *painful* for a squishy. Had an Ice/Kin Corrupter who, after a few good kills at first, quickly had a habit of "walk outside, find an enemy, get stunned/help/terrorized and die, go to hospital, repeat". I couldn't find anyone to give me any sort of mez protection either, so I basically had no way to avoid this. Made EM insanely powerful and Controllers or Dark Defenders able to take down my Corrupter with laughable ease. I had one person hold me right near a neutral pillbox and just watched the turrents take me out. Really frustrating. I can live without other inspirations quite easily, but Breakfrees are pretty much required.
My SS/Inv Brute, however, did quite well. Having never gotten a Brute up to that level, I rather enjoyed the feeling of actual resists, especially with so many heroes using smashing damage. Broadsword Scrappers couldn't kill me unless I just let all of my toggles drop, though I had a hard time taking one down one-on-one without a good 50% or more Fury. However, against anything aside from Tankers or Scrappers, Rage was good enough to make me not care about Fury at all. I initially only slotted one accuracy in most attacks to see how much Rage would give; although I probably need 2 in all attacks, it was good enough when Rage was running. Unstoppable was amazing, allowing me to wade into a pitch battle and starting taking down people without caring about my HP at all. At one point I took on a group of 8 or 10 solo; I ended the fight constantly taunted and with virtually zero recharge, but they seemed to be impressed afterwords. Extremely fun.
Amazingly stable too. Although a friend of mine reported having trouble getting on, I stayed on for several hours straight with no problems. My only complaints are that I mostly only saw Stone Tankers, Broadswords or Spines Scrappers (Impale is insanely good and extremely annoying) and Illusion or Mind controllers, with some Empaths wandering around.
Incidentally, although my Brute didn't have Taunt, it seems like everyone likes attacking a huge character in a suit.
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I don't know if this has been mentioned but the 1 hp hospital trip just slows things down. Its a real annoyance. Can't we have full health or at least half?
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/not signed, that delay that annoys you, makes the zone one where tactics matter, past waiting for a regrouping. Right now, you kill someone, and he wont be back for at least a minute or two, allowing you to do something. remove that delay, and local area wins become unlikely.
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Fair enough, but then it needs to be implemented in a more equitable fashion, since /Regens and self healing types can get back into the action with nary a delay while poor stupid schmucks like Dominators nearly spend more time in the hospital than out in the zone. Give people who die a stackable two minute 'rez sickness' debuff or something.
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Use a powerboosted aid self and you can go from dead to PVP again real fast, especially if you stamina.
I dont mind this, but I do think all powers should recharge. Its a double whammy for a dom with a pet to die, because he comes out and cant resummon a pet for quite a while.
Few new observations:
1. Lots and lots of debt from playing in the zone. Lots of high-power wandering NPCs, taking pillboxes involves risking debt. At least sirens you could avoid the battles and npcs were mostly static.
2. The spawning at 1 hp thing is almost completely negated if you have a self-heal.
3. oddly enough, not having focused accuracy meant teir 9 defense powers were too strong. This was easier to notice in this test because it was 40s versus 40s. What this means eventually is that sets like SR scrappers will be unstoppable, because it's much harder for villians to get the neccessary +acc.
I agree that the NPCs are over done. You maanage to flee a losing fight in PVP, and everywhere you turn is a warden. Appearently, they not only grow on trees but the trees were recently harvested.
Same for the pill box guns. They will kill a squishy trying to get a pillbox, but a blaster with aim+BU+TF will kill you without taking a hit as you sit in the middle of the turrents. How about a hurricane effect for the middle of the turrents until the guns are down?
Even my tank couldnt take turrents, are they supposed to be EB/AV difficulty?
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I agree that the NPCs are over done. You maanage to flee a losing fight in PVP, and everywhere you turn is a warden. Appearently, they not only grow on trees but the trees were recently harvested.
Same for the pill box guns. They will kill a squishy trying to get a pillbox, but a blaster with aim+BU+TF will kill you without taking a hit as you sit in the middle of the turrents. How about a hurricane effect for the middle of the turrents until the guns are down?
Even my tank couldnt take turrents, are they supposed to be EB/AV difficulty?
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Today was the first time I really noticed the marauding level 54 Huntsman Bosses that seemed to be patrolling the entire zone. WTH!!!! Having a nice friendly fight with a Brute and a Stalker on my Ice Tanker and WHAM! Practically one shot!!! My teammies asked what happened from across the zone.
I saw this same group of 4 wandering all over the map. The only time they would EVER meet any resistance is when they caught up to a Stoner and that is just because they are too slow to get away. 
hmmm as for one shotting the guy at the turret controls, why not give the turrets the same effect to their controller that a masterminds pets in guardian mode give to said mastermind, so long as he doesnt use an attack himself?
Freakshow Raver: I love your knives. You know, you can use them on me later if ya want.
Knives of Artemis Raver: Right
Which Turrets (turrents?) are you talking? I found that once the pill box is taken, the Turrets become EASY. (kind of... still painful when they are all hitting you at once) The reason being that before they are capture, the are level 54 Bosses. Once taken, they are level 50 (though still no idea why a couple always shows up yellow instead of orange yet still say boss next to it.) You do much less damage to a +4 boss then an even level one. (not to mention your accuracy)
During an empty period, I had to go get one of the mechs to destroy the turrets on an unclaimed pill box. Those things were eating me.
hmmm, part of the turrets weakness in uncontrolled mode is that they cycle though opponents, I dont suppose any testing was done on how effective a controlled turret with minimal outside support was against a team?
btw I also noted in one instance, that after a turret got taken and then pounded to dust by signiture characters, the other side never bothered coming over to claim the free pillbox
Freakshow Raver: I love your knives. You know, you can use them on me later if ya want.
Knives of Artemis Raver: Right
Spent a few hours in RV as an INV/SS tank and I enjoyed myself. I finally felt like a tank again. I could be killed, but not easily and certainly not by a lone stalker.
Regarding the "Heavies:" Once you know where the platform is, it's easy enough to swing by and see if its available. A click on the control panel and it becomes your minion, just like mastermind pets and arena gladiators. The noise it makes coming off the platform is either the same sound as an assassin strike or dang close to it. Everytime I activated one, I jumped in my seat at that sound. Heavies are best for defending or taking pillboxes. It is so slow that it really can't keep up with the pace of Co* PvP. By the time it gets around to attacking your target, the target is out of range or dead. But it's very good to take down turrets for you and then help hold the fort. I controlled a turret and a heavy and was able to kill a few villains that came too close. I was also able to use hurl from the control box, so I expect that other range powers *cough*webgrenades*cough* will as well. I did feel that I was able to hog my heavy though. If I died, so did he. But even with the wait to heal up, he was still waiting for me on the platform. I would suggest more and more heavies become available to assist instead of the GM level signature characters.
Regarding the Signature Characters: I only saw one, Ghost Widow, and that was enough for me. With unstoppable, temp. invulnerability, tough, unyielding, and dull pain running, she had me in the red in what seemed like two seconds. I have tanked AVs and GMs for years now and never been hit that hard (except for psi which ignores all my shields).
[On a side note - I had a terrible time on live with Madam of Mystery Carny AV. We had 6 heroes on her and couldn't dent her HP at all. We invited a level 50 MA scrapper (AV was 47) who sk another scrapper to 49 and it still took several minutes of all of us spamming every power we had at her. This was on live - and I left out the multiple team wipes and miscellaneous deaths before we cornered her and had two emps alternating heals and auras. I can't imagine what she will be like with a buff!]
I had fun for the most part, but I think some improvements could be made. I would like to see more minions and lts to pick off for inspiration drops. Having to fight bosses was difficult, lead to an ocassional death (and debt), and protracted battles leaves me a sitting duck. I would also like to see more heavies, as mentioned above, and a decrease in the power of signature characters. Most of all, I would like to see missions and temp powers from completing patrols like we get in the other zones. I would suggest quantum flight from the peacebringer set, as I think that seems like a logical step up from the other zone temp powers.
[Second side note: Is anyone else getting the feeling that this game is becoming City of Pets or City of Minions? Every issue brings more and more pet-type stuff. I prefer powers and gadgets to pets. I don't recall that many heroes and villains from the comics having pets].
50s: Inv/SS PB Emp/Dark Grav/FF DM/Regen TA/A Sonic/Elec MA/Regen Fire/Kin Sonic/Rad Ice/Kin Crab Fire/Cold NW Merc/Dark Emp/Sonic Rad/Psy Emp/Ice WP/DB FA/SM
Overlord of Dream Team and Nightmare Squad
You guy show so much promise most of the time....i think that's what's so aggravating when you don't fix the simple stuff.
rolled up an elec/dark brute and went for it. he was reasonably survivable but fury is non existent in PVP....not enough resistance. I'm dead before it does me any good, just like blaster:defiance and don't get me started on defenders: vigilance, by the time any of these powers kick in...someone's dead...nice ideas just poorly executed. How about this for defenders, the more damage is being doled (to them or teammates) out the more their secondary effects are boosted (endurance, mez's, holds, etc.) that seems like it's more in keeping with what you were going for and would allow them to "defend" their teammates without making them unbalanced. Wouldn't/Shouldn't help as much when soloing (but it should help somewhat as it is now...it's worthless when solo) and while the game is meant to be social it shouldn't be a necessity to team to enjoy playing. You guys really dig a great job on the fix for controllers though...wrong thread but kudos nonetheless.
make us love you again like we know you can.
Dyslexic Nam - lvl 50 Rad/Rad pinnacle
Fark - lvl 31 PB pinnacle
Blazing Blue Ox - lvl 36 fire/ice tank pinnacle
Master Mold - lvl 34 rob/FF MM pinnacle
Bicurious George - lvl 34 ill/rad troller freedom
Retrogirl - lvl 25 kin/elec def freedom
Nth Man - lvl 18 energy/EM blapper
and so many freakin' alts rolled lvl'ed to their teens and deleted it's ridonkulous.
I wish my brother, Pancho was here.
Hey hey,
So, I was in RV last night for awhile. I was testing some builds and At's and getting killed a lot. I think my MM lasted the least amount of time. the Rad/Kin corruptor did ok, but not having a decent team was bad. My EM/Regen Stalker was fun, but it is what I play on live. Anyway, after awhile and some exploring, I see a heavy terminal. It was empty, but I clicked the computer anyway. Then, a heavy appears and I get to control it!! Weee!
Ok, so I figure out that it will go back tofollow mode and out of attack my target mode after each fight. I grag the attack mode icon into my power tray and all is well. Now, after we kill the target, I target someone elase and hit the icon in my power bar, whallah! he then rumbles toward the enemy and kills ensue. Pretty cool, but the the kicker is...I get INSP, XP, ENH and INF. for every kill!
S I tow this big thing all over the place, searching for Bosses. We kill them, often withou my AS even getting to hit, and I get NICE INSP....ACC, HEALTH, END, BF...BF!!!
Anyway, I just though I would share, the lack of ins at the start was toubling but they were filling up my tray pretty quickly after awhile. I logged out/crashed with a full tray of nice INSP.
Oh, anyone else have lots LOTS of sound loop crashes last night??
*C*
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2. The spawning at 1 hp thing is almost completely negated if you have a self-heal.
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I wonder how long before Defenders start staying behind at the base, patching up the wounded so they can get back to the war ASAP. I know a few people who might really like this idea...
Went to play a squishy corrupter for a bit ice/rad. Still got owned bad by scrappers. Not as bad as my dom but still it sort of sucks.
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2. The spawning at 1 hp thing is almost completely negated if you have a self-heal.
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I wonder how long before Defenders start staying behind at the base, patching up the wounded so they can get back to the war ASAP. I know a few people who might really like this idea...
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I hope this doesn't become the norm.
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I wonder how long before Defenders start staying behind at the base, patching up the wounded so they can get back to the war ASAP. I know a few people who might really like this idea...
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It's like a whole zone of people helping me farm the SG heal badges...
Mwahaha...
@Mindshadow
My thoughts:
When a pillbox is neutral, those level 54 turrets can pretty much one shot my dom. Not cool.
Second of all, where the heck are the villain heavies? I see hero heavy stations everywhere, but I've seen one villain station.
Oh, also, lots of pillboxes were bugged.
there's another close to the hero base. one the map, where the street heads west into the base? off to the side of that street there's one, not sure of any others
Freakshow Raver: I love your knives. You know, you can use them on me later if ya want.
Knives of Artemis Raver: Right
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2. The spawning at 1 hp thing is almost completely negated if you have a self-heal.
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I wonder how long before Defenders start staying behind at the base, patching up the wounded so they can get back to the war ASAP. I know a few people who might really like this idea...
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I hope this doesn't become the norm.
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erm, I've seen people use multiple accounts, with empathy defender on the second account, leaving them in base in order to buff their main character. It'd be very easy to leave their character there firing off autoheals. Might even be a good way to work on supergroup heal badges.
"...it also feels like a GM saying 'Oh hey, you guys seem to have forgotten your place. In case you don't remember, MY CHARACTER IS BETTER THAN YOURS, HAHAHAHA.' -- Shinsektor
I have to agree with Shin. I'd much prefer four or five less powerful ATs come out and attack rather than two at a time. It feels... immodest.
I did have an interesting moment in RV. Brawler and Manticore spent a whole minute digging my stone brute out of his pillbox. They almost seemed frustrated.
Other experiences weren't so positive.
Doms... "which of my twenty different puny attacks should I open with before you chain-mez me?"
MMs... "after spending two minutes setting up, could you heroes actually show up on my lagging screen -before- the hospital button this time?"
Corruptors... "now y'all heroes wait just a minute or two while we zap each other with these buffs."
Brutes... "Oh, how I wish I could live long enough for my fury bar to do some good."
Stone brutes... "Why won't anybody play with me?"
Dark/SR stalker... "wow, I can actually stick around and fight. This is almost as fun as scrapping!"