If he does run, ... he'll just hit the floor face first.
JFS!
Relentless Session 27-28
The Kin's on vacation this week, so we picked up some SG mates the two nights. Finished an arc, and then ran papers to work towards L35 and the SF. Maybe we'll run the 2nd respec next week. We're all L34 or close, I think.
Relentless Session 29-30
More regular missions at +2, nothing terribly exciting. Have only had partial team most of the past few sessions, so still trying to hit a groove with the new makeup. I think all but 3 are L35 and ready for SF.
Relentless Session 31-32
Ironically, despite I9 opening up on Test we had the entire team running on Live. We just ran more arc missions at +2, but it felt like we were starting to 'get our groove on'. Need to get one guy upto L35, and then start the SF. Interestingly, our levels per session are right on track with the hero run.
Relentless Session 33-34
Got everyone to L35, and then we started the SF with six L36's and two L35's. As expected, the first mission spawned L42 CoTs. Finally, something more than +2's, but unfortunately some of the team wasn't too keen on a multi-night slugfest. We agreed to proceed until the first team wipe. First fight went better than I had anticipated. It was long and not worth the time spent, but we had no defeats. Right at the end we aggro'd a second group, and suffered a few losses but pulled it out. Personally, I think the dominator saved the day. As we wrapped up that fight, we discovered a debuff toggle had run off. The first hint was when the first brute went down in what she called 'a stampede of a thousand hooves'. Yeh, Behemoths everywhere. We wiped.
So.
Ran the Bricks mayhem, lol. Then lowered the difficulty and reformed SF so that it will give L40's. We'll increase it as we level, in order to keep the mobs at about +4 to +5. We'll start the first mission next week.
To be honest, I think we all had fun with the +6's. It was a great fight mainly due to the unexpected. The unexpected never happens against +3 and lower, because the fights are easy and have such limited duration. About half of us would be willing to slug it out against +6, just because its there. The other half dont really find that entertaining, especially considering there's no added reward incentive to do so. So, we're targetting something in the middle. And I'll make the point again, there's precious few opportunities in missions to achieve this.
Relentless Session 35-36
Our team of mixed L36 and L37 ran the Crystal of Serafina Strikeforce against L41 foes. I believe we were all L37 by the time we finished. We're meshing well now, though not like it was on Heroes. I suspect thats probably due to the 'blurring' of Villain AT roles.
Early in the SF we had switched back to toggle pulling tactics for the +5s. Partway thru, there was a mission with a large number of Tsoo. Pulling Tsoo is about like herding cats. Between the TP and Siphon Speed, they just scatter. With some effort we switched gears and started zerg mezzing, and it was far more effective. Tsoo are one of my favorite groups to fight largely because of the variety of powers they have. Its design element I'd like to see Cryptic pursue more, that is, mobs dont have to have more HP to be 'harder' they need access to more powers.
So, onto the last mission. Only one of us had ever run the SF before, and he was keeping quiet so it would be 'all new' to the rest of us. The CoV Sf's are really well done, with this being another very neat last map. I seriously hesitated before jumping into the pit. If you've done it, maybe you know what I mean. If you haven't, then I hope I'm not ruining the surprise. Moving along, we finally get to the AV and at about half health I'm thinking, "Pfft, well this guy isnt very interesting..." So, one slow, agonizing group wipe later I find myself rethinking that evaluation. The multiple waves and the option to use the room environment was pretty cool, although not knowing better beforehand we weren't able to capitalize. In hindsight its a pretty neat design. Anyway, we came back and beat the AV without a repeat of the first fight.
Good stuff! Now back to lowly +2's...
Relentless Session 37-38
Ran a couple random missions, including the one with Indigo. In general, the only thing we're contending with is knockback on the corrs and the dom's ability to generate far more aggro than he can handle. Yeh, I guess I should spend the time to get some HP accolades. 
Started the Respec trial with the team split between L37 and L38 up against mostly L41's and some L42's. Good fights, engaging but not interminably long. Freedom went down near the end of the first mission, so we had to re-do it and then called it a night with most at L38.
Relentless Session 39
We wrapped up the Respec Trial on Relentless. All 88 vines conned purple and it took a few attempts. Ultimately, splitting into two groups proved successful. I realize that isnt an uncommon strategy, but against purple vines we were of the opinion that when split up our damage rate would be too low, but by splitting up we I think we avoided scourge 'overkill'. The AV itself was no challenge, and didnt even spawn the ambush. Grats to the Team for sticking it out, I know a few members really dislike that mission.
Invincible Session 65
Issue 9 launched on the same day as a regular Team session. Thank you, Cryptic. We had been planning to run the new States TF on the first regular session night of I9. Our Kin/Rad defender was unable to return for opening night, but the newest member of the vills team joined us with a L50 Ice/Kin.
Most of us hadn't played these toons in months, but a few groups into the first mission and we were back in stride. We blazed through groups and completely shrugged off ambushes with unspoken coordination. For me, it was more evidence to support the perception that hero ATs team so well compared to vills. I think about half of us had done the STF on Test already. I, myself hadnt, and so thought it was pretty entertaining. Oh, and the irony of doing the Vills respec on back to back nights with different ATs, lol.
As we rolled into the last mission, a storm was brewing. Literally, a thunder storm came through in RL. My wife, a regular team member, and I DC'ed twice clearing upto the AVs. Once back on, I pulled Ghost Widow, but she de-aggro'd on the way and re-tagging her brought Mako. We worked on taking her down, though it was a bit slow since the Blasters couldnt go melee. At one point, Mako decided he didnt like my AoEs and took me out. I think that was our only death for the night. Turning our attention towards Mako, my wife and I DC'ed again. We got back in and at about 50%, DC'ed again.
The storm had subsided, but the damage was done. After seven years of near perfect reliability, our DSL was going intermittant. Down at the bottom of the driveway, two utility crews were working frantically to restore the integrity of the connection. Pylons, flares, and emergency spotlights were deployed. Traffic was diverted. Mako had hit elude. Clearly, the utility crews understood the urgency of the situation. We kept logging in, only to reach the battle and fire at most once before DC'ing again. Twenty? Thirty times? I lost count. I logged into IM on my mobile phone and got the play by play from the team. Someone shouted 'Gather for Vengeance'. I'm fairly certain it wasnt the utility crew. Mako was defeated by the remaining six members of the team.
Exhausted, we agreed to save the rest for Friday night. The utility crews, however, toiled on.
It was nice of you to show up AFTER we beat Mako. 
Invincible Session 66
Scheduling conflicts required us to postpone until last night. Which at this point, all but one of us had completed the STF on our other various toons.
We pulled Mako first. Since we've been routinely fighting +5's we were already spec'd for high accuracy and his Elude was easily overcome. The next pull brought Scirroco and Scorpion. Easily tanked, easily defeated. Last we tackled Ghost Widow, which again was no trouble as the team was not reliant on melee or pet damage by design.
Took down the flyer quick. Moving on to Recluse, we prepped with a Vengeance buff although it probably wasnt necessary. In our haste, we tripped up and got to the first tower before the tank had Recluse's attention. We scrambled around a bit, but got it sorted out. In taking down the second tower, we were harassed by mobs from the respawned flyer. In the confusion, we were sloppy and somehow a repairman mustve survived. By the time we took down the third, we realized the second had gone back up. Just a sloppy mistake, though it didnt impact the outcome. We took down all four towers eventually. With power boosted sonic shields, and a kickin empath, the tank didnt have any trouble. He even stopped using purples, so it wouldn't have mattered how long it took. The Recluse take down was pretty straight forward, FS and nuked the spawn.
So, another successful outing for Team Invince. It would've been cool if we had finished it opening night, but at least our first run was a success. It doesn't appear that the original Kin will be returning to the game anytime soon. And since the STF doesnt require a very specific team build for success, we probably wont have a continuing reunion of Team Invince. Besides, we still have villains to level.
All in all, I'm pretty happy with the STF. It's entertaining and not unreasonably long. The initial 'mayhem' mission is pretty cool. The AVs on the RV map could be spawned randomly. Specific spawn points and no risk of accidental aggro makes that a rather mindless mission. The villain respec is a clever re-use of content. The security chief mission is clever in concept, but the sheer size of the map makes it feel like too much of a timesink. You come into the mission with the anticipation of hitting Doc Aeon, but then you gotta keep flipping rock till you find the key. I'd cut the number of spawns, it ruins the pace as is. The final mission is well done, and I expected that in order to challenge heroes a mission would need to have several simulataneous tasks to split the team up. I certainly plan to run this several times a week.
Relentless Session 40
Back to vills, but only six members were available to play. Ran some contact missions with AV's, including Wretch and Ice Mistral. I think we're all L38.
Relentless Session 41
Seven of us running more regular mission leveled to 39.
Since Issue9 I've been mainly playing various L50 heros where my 'total' inventory space across all toons is vastly larger than on villains. I've been progressing on the L45/50 crafting badges off of drops, while selling most rare and uncommon drops to fund the operation. The situation on villainside is quite different. With only one L39 toon, the limited inventory makes full participation impractical. Having run mostly in prestige mode for 38 levels means inf is scarce. However, I was able to buy up L40 crafted IO's extremely cheaply and respec out of my L35/40 SO's to net out about 1.3M inf. I've pretty much ruled out Sets for this toon. While 35's might be attainable, 40+ with the higher salvage bracket is simply too expensive. The limited inventory space and the pace at which we play fills inventory in about 45 minutes. We only have two 2hr windows to play and can't rationalize spending that time managing inventory. So we're pretty much deleting drops as we go or dumping it on stores if happen to go by. Its disappointing that we cant accumulate a couple sessions worth of drops and sort it out during downtime.
Relentless Session 42-43
Six to seven us made the two nights. Continuing the slow grind to L45.
Relentless Session 44
More +2 mobs. L40. Getting hard to keep everyone's interest.
[ QUOTE ]
Relentless Session 44
More +2 mobs. L40. Getting hard to keep everyone's interest.
[/ QUOTE ]
You are soooo close though so don't give up. After all, we need you guys to have level 50 villains when we plan a Hamidon raid on the villain side.
[ QUOTE ]
You are soooo close though so don't give up. After all, we need you guys to have level 50 villains when we plan a Hamidon raid on the villain side.
[/ QUOTE ]
Gah! As if I need more goals ...
Relentless Session 45
Starting the Patron arcs with all but two of the team at L40. We'll probably try to hit at least 3 of the 4 for variety. Hopefully, the AV's will spice things up.
Relentless Session 46-47
With the full eight both nights, we got as far as unlocking one or two patron's powers. Team now ranges from L39 to L41.
Relentless Session 48
Still plodding along. L40 to L42. Its not news, but Villains needs more TFs.
Relenless Session 49-50
All patrons are unlocked, continued along with those arcs and some arachnoid missions. The team is roughly L41-42. Our session time has dropped to about 1.5 hours.
Relentless Session 51-52
We took a break last week on account of the holidays. I think it was refreshing, because we seemed much more focused this week. We did the Arachnoid Cure and Miss Francine arcs. Of course, it was just +2 missions but we took out our frustrations on Positron in the Kuhr'Rekt arcs. Despite his attempt at smack talk, the fight was over in less 60 seconds even with the team split between two groups. Maybe now he'll look at expanding the mission slider. 
It was interesting running alternating missions of Rikti and Longbow and comparing the difference in their effectiveness. Forget about Vanguard, today's Rikti wouldnt stand a chance against the Longbow. They'll need some serious upgrades to stage any kind of an Invasion. Which is my lame attempt to segway into saying that we're looking forward to running this team in the RWZ come Issue10.
Relentless Session 53-54
Had the whole team together for about 90 mins both nights. Ran some more +2 arcs with AVs. All but 2-3 of the team is L44.
Relentless Session 55-56
We weren't able to get the entire team together either night, but we did run another AV mission and a few missions in RWZ with about six of us. The first couple of us started dinging L45. The goal now will be to catch everyone and do the Lady Grey TF, though I did hear mention that <45's could join. might have to try that.
I'se found that the one time i'se done the villain respec that the only way we could kill the vines was splittin the team in half an' each half killin the vines til we met at the AV.
It was much easier then runnin around the room in circles.
Now Team EJFS just did a mish where we had ta stop Crimson from runnin. There ain't no way in pie ta stop an AV once he gits his mind ta it (he got away), do ya think Team Relentless is man enuff ta stop an AV from runnin?
JFS
-The Legendary J-Man-