Issue 9 Hamidon Overview, 4/3/2007
By
Anglican,
Posted on: 2007-04-03 11:32 in The Market and Inventions
I'm thinking that blues have a bigger aggro range than yellows, just from observation. Standing at the smaller rock, ne of the safe rock, I was hit by a blue. This is about the same aggro range for yellows. And given that blues are further back, it seems that their aggro range is bigger. But I'll wait for the official aggro maps before I form a firm opinion.
Uber Talgrim - level 50 emp/dark defender
Uber Rod - level 50 dark melee/regen scrapper
Rod Valdr - level 50 invuln/SS tanker
Talgrim - level 50 ninja/dark mastermind
OMG!! Please add these costume designs now!
I think blues and yellows have the same aggro range, from the testing I've been doing near the SE rock in the Hive. The blues are a little closer to Hamidon, thus farther away from us, but I used the SE rock as an aggro protection device and if I got much closer the yellows would attack, but not the blues. I didn't get close enough to have blues attack me.
Regardless, both have a range that is further than their aggro distance, and once you snipe at any of them, you get return fire from them. So far when I've sniped a blue I've had that blue and 2 yellows attack me. I can't tell if more would attack, as the SE rock blocks many of them.
Still, you would be looking at almost simultaneous aggro from both yellows and blues, especially if you close to attack.
Uber Talgrim - level 50 emp/dark defender
Uber Rod - level 50 dark melee/regen scrapper
Rod Valdr - level 50 invuln/SS tanker
Talgrim - level 50 ninja/dark mastermind
OMG!! Please add these costume designs now!
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I'm thinking that blues have a bigger aggro range than yellows, just from observation. Standing at the smaller rock, ne of the safe rock, I was hit by a blue. This is about the same aggro range for yellows. And given that blues are further back, it seems that their aggro range is bigger. But I'll wait for the official aggro maps before I form a firm opinion.
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Based on this I think the assumption of a 150' range for Blues in the overview might be a tad off. 
Sometime I REALLY would like to test tonight Heroside if an attempt is being made. I've got plans all weekend so I'll be unavailable for anything Saturday/Sunday, but the method to find out unprovoked aggro range is just above. That would help us find out exactly how far we can set up from the Goo for each run.
And I'm not sure if the Aggro range is larger than a Yellow. Their range might be the 600', but if you don't attack them (Blues) they tend to leave you alone until you get pretty close. The furthest I got attacked from in my 4 or 5 demorecords was about 180'-200'.
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Human_Being tried it with a demorecord, but that only gives you the locations where they attacked (where you where when the attack was made) and there's a verified 2-3 wait between when you aggro them (with snipe for example) and when they'll have their attack cycled up and used.
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WHAT?? No! The demorecord was to get the exact location of the Nucleus like you asked for.
Check the email again. I list two /loc numbers. The Aggro range data was from that very method you listed. I selected a yellow on the far side and lined it up with it's diametric opposite on our near side so that I knew I was making a straightline approach.
Eep! Sent you the map projection of those points. Busy week with 3 projects due and Freshman to herd into writing a group paper (it's a lot like herding cats). Why did I ever decide to go back to college? 
/mapmonkeyshuffle
Ok, we've got solid information on Yellow Aggro range (when not attacked).
I'll be preparing an overview map Soon™ for Hero and Villain side. The tested and confirmed range of Aggro is 250' from the Yellow Mitos.
Special thanks to Human_Being, TopDoc, and Tlatoani for helping gather the information.
HB, when are you going to get you an avatar?
Aggro Range and Attack Ranges for Yellow Mitos are up for Heroside and Villianside.
Also, new links that aren't on my personal webserver for The Hive and The Abyss.
Adding these. I was hesitant when you PMed me Laserman, 'cause they didn't really look up to snuff. These look much better.
Edit: NUOOO!! EDIT RIGHT EXPIRE, DESU! DOOOOOM!
LOLZ
No worries. They've been approved for two different class final projects, so they're just going to get more professional looking. I was focused mainly on getting information out to start with, now I'll be cleaning 'em up. Let me know if you think something needs to get cleaned up or added as far as dimensions go.
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HB, when are you going to get you an avatar?
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Probably some time after Arcanaville does 
.
Here's my report and impressions from the 4/5/07 Villain test-run on Hamidon organized by Lemur Lad. Even though there's a lot of information to share this is pretty long. But I kind of have to tell it this way.
To start off with, we attempted the Yellows with a team of 5 Brutes including myself, plus Lemur's Dominator as Team Teleport/Group Fly-Battle Taxi. Each member of the team was given 4 EoE, 2 Large Breakfrees (Mag 20, 90 sec duration) and 3 Medium Breakfrees (Mag 15, 60 sec duration); the Breakfrees to be used should anti-mezz buffs be insufficient. I also invited a Mind Control Dominator to the team (Dr.Mindbinder) and asked him to follow us in on foot and see if Mind's ranged attacks would hit the Yellow given that they are only typed Psi_Attack.
The method of attack was the 'standard' Team Teleport to the Mito under EoE and attack it with 6 melee characters. Group Fly being used to keep everyone in contact with the Mito and maintain DPS. By report Scrapper teams hero side have this down to 20 sec per Mito.
Our first target was to take down a single Yellow as a practice run and get everyone oriented. After the first was down we would begin trying for more than one in a row. We had /Colds, /Therms, and at least one /Kin and one /Rad buffing us.
In both jumps 1 and 2 we failed to take down that first Yellow. It's disorienting and the environment so punishing that even a tiny mistake can cause the attack to fail in the 60 sec window of an EoE. As an example: upon teleporting in you still must hit Follow to close and then manually maneuver into melee range around the Mito with several other teammates. On the first jump I over-shot the Yellow in the confusion and ended up near the Blue line. Both the Blues and Greens aggroed and started shooting. I had to stop, hit Unstoppable (3 sec activation) to protect myself from the Greens, then retrace to the mito with Slow effects from the Blue-shots, the Goo, and Group Fly reducing my speed. This is a good 10+ sec I wasn't helping the team because I held "W" a moment too long. There's lots of little things you can do wrong with severe punishment until you get situated.
On our third jump we added a 6th Brute who had been locked out of the zone-limit for the first two runs. the third jump took down the first mito in 60sec. After more EoE was distributed we tried for two in a row and the 2nd and 3rd Yellow mitos were taken down each in 60sec. In four attempted attackes we'd taken down the southern 3 Yellow mitos. With only 3 spare EoE that was the end of the formal jumps for Yellow Mito clearing.
Observations:<ul type="square">[*]I glanced at my Fury bar several times while fighting the Yellows and the reads fluxuated around +150% damage, so Fury was building fine. Never-the-less, we still never bettered our time from 60 sec per Yellow. I actually thought we hadn't taken down the 3rd one because it was defeated just a moment after my EoE coverage vanished and I went down. This is a far cry from 6 Scrappers defeating a yellow in 20-30sec. Was this due to simple lack of practice or the lower base damage of a Brute putting them further behind in the healing race against the Greens? I don't know. This is the first time we've been able to mount a formal attack on one Yellow with multiple Brutes under EoE.
[*]We had two /Fire Brutes in the team and neither was able to lay Burn on the small platform of the Mito. It would have been nice to see but this tactic doesn't work 
.
[*]The Mind/ Dominator was able to score hits on the Yellow. While they have Ranged defense they do not have defense against Psi attacks. This means that both Psionic Assault melee attacks and Mind/ Ranged attacks (along with Blind from Illusion control) can be used on a Yellow mito. None of those does a terribly large amount of damage, but every little bit can help.
[*]One of the present /Cold Corrs (Frigid Wytch? Sorry, not sure on your name) told me that while we were attacking she had managed to land a Heat Loss on the Yellow. She knew this both from the animation and the report in her combat log. I asked her to repeat this in our next run on the chance she had just gotten a lucky 5% to-hit floor shot. It landed the next time as well. Heat Loss is an auto-hit debuff and this opens the possiblity of other auto-hit and toggle debuffs being applied to the Yellow mitos.
[*]The change to Thaw and Antidote including Fear and Confuse in their protected mezzes is fantastic. We didn't have /Sonics there but still could keep ourselves safe from the Blues without piles of Breakfrees.[/list]
I heard that this one time _Castle_ forgot to bring his lunch to work and Chuck Norris offered to split his sandwich with him .<ul type="square">
[*]In previous times in the Goo I've always been loaded up with Breakfrees due to lack of available Corr support. This means I've usually had anywhere from 40-75 mag knockback protection on me. I've had a few times where that was not true but only a few. On two of our jumps this time I went in with only my Unyeilding toggle and a stack of Thaws. With all of Hamidon shooting at us I never took knockback. I've suspected for a while that the knockback component wasn't as high as some have been reporting and now I'm pretty sure just a standard melee toggle or Acrobatics is enough to protect from it. What this means is that a Melee team wouldn't have to depend on extra buffing from a /Kin with Increase Density or Breakfrees; the mezz protections from other Corr types without knockback protection should do just as well.
[*]Even with a small amount of EoE, experimenting is problematic because the small slip ups that come with learning are severely punished. The Villain side Monster Island-alike is coming (and in good hands from what I hear), but we need it badly. It's hard to maintain a steady stream of testing on this side because even a small mistake is just so darn expensive.[/list]
Out of EoE and with 3 Yellows still up, we followed Jeromus' idea of simply throwing everyone in the zone with a mellee attack at a Mito. The testers split into two groups with a smaller third. Lemur took charge of a ranged group along with part of the present Corrs. The melee characters plus a few support-buffing corruptors made the second. Foxboy/Lady Nogitsune (later replaced by Zombie Man just as Lady N was leaving) with a small team formed an attempted Nucleus taunting group. While he had a taunt-Brute and /Therms the multiple yellows still up meant he had to use pet-streams to try this. How well this distraction worked was inconclusive. The southern Yellows had been cleared so this is where the Ranged team was, the Melee team was to the north east, and the Nucleus group was at 11 O'clock Rock; all three had to be out of direct sight of what the others were doing.
For the first mass-rush on a mito, three (3)! Warburg Bio nukes were dropped on the group. Casualties among the 20+ attackers were total, but the Mito was successfully defeated. After recall-n'-rezz and regrouping, we went after the fifth Yellow. Without the +450% damage to the group from the previous run we failed to defeat the Yellow and again everyone in the wave was downed. A second attempt at the fifth Mito had similar results.
While this was going on the ranged group had tried to engage the Blues at the same time as the melee group was attacking. The Yellows fired on the ranged characters as well as the melee group, overwhelmed the healing umbrella, and casualties were apparently 'quite high' .
Observations:<ul type="square">[*]Taking a Yellow down with an EoE-less bum rush does work. I informed Jeromus later that his methods were "crude and uncivilized, and they got the job done". But you have to really want it to work. If this becomes a tactic that is likely to be necessary in a Live raid it will very much hurt the popularity of Hamidon runs.
[*]Even just two Yellows were enough to halt 20+ people trying to maul one of them.
[*]Even without the EoE, the massive buffs to the entire group from the Warburg Bio nukes let us take down the 4th Yellow in short order. This applied only to that mito though since the buff vanishes on defeat and the speed with which the Yellow was destroyed still wasn't enough to allow survivors to escape the fire from the other two.[/list]
At this point in the evening, with people drifting away, morale dropping, frustration building, and the likelyhood of making any more headway disappearing, I noticed a character I'd been looking for over the past week. I'd been collecting the EoE for this test-run since back in Closed Beta and announced on those boards that I now had enough to make an attempt at a Yellow clearing. When I posted this announcement, one of the people who had donated 7 EoE to me posted that, in that case, they wanted their 7 back. I hadn't seen this person in-game since then and expecting the evening to end soon I sent them a tell informing them that I had their 7 still sitting in the base bin, hadn't used them, and could return them after we were done here. They replied that they had only been joking and I could certainly use it.
I sent a tell to Lemur and Jeromus telling them to wait because I'd just gotten access to 7 more EoE and went to base to retreive it. The 3 I had remaindered from before, the new 7, and 1 contributed from Mjorn's group arriving from Abyss2 meant we had enough for EoE to cover a core group of brutes for two runs (6 the first and 5 for the second). We gathered the people that were left, launched in again, and had the satisfaction of of watching the 5th Mito vanish with a few seconds to spare on EoE coverage. The ranged group had tried to move in again but even one unengaged Yellow was enough to stop their advance.
Around this time we began to experience zone-wide mapserver delays. I don't know that anyone actually had to relog, but from chatter it seemed everyone was affected by the freezes.
For the final Yellow mito, enough on its own to keep us away from the Blues, we had a smaller group of around 15 meleers, no major external buffs, fewer supporting Corrs, and only 5 characters under EoE. Do-or-die we launched at the last Yellow and in flight the improvisation of debuffing the yellow with my WB Chemical nuke occured to me. I dropped it in my tray and fired when I arrived with the first group. Did it hit? I'm not sure. Between the AoE flashes, Aura Pulses, and general confusion it was impossible to see any debuff graphic. I'm not even certain it was low enough to the ground to be in the area of effect to begin with. To my eyes it looked like we ripped much larger chunks out of it and went down alot faster, but I'm not certain I could trust my time-sense in all the excitement. Most of the attackers were still alive when the last one went down.
Observations:<ul type="square">[*]A Warburg Chemical nuke may or may not be able to debuff a Yellow Mito. This should be considered annecdotal until someone else can confirm it actually hits.
[*]A core of meleers under 1 minute of EoE with a swarm of kamikaze followers can take down a Yellow, but if there is another around it does not appreciably improve the survival of either group.
[*]A single surviving Yellow mito was enough to prevent the rangers from advancing under a healing umbrella.[/list]
We defeated the last Yellow...
...and the Raid instantly became a Mob. It had been 3 hours since we started trying to take down the Yellow Wall. The frustrated and long-waiting ranged team immediately attacked. Jeromus and I tried to call the meleers back but they still wanted blood. The Brutes and Stalkers swarmed into the Goo from where the last Yellow died. The Taunt team ran in to take up their assigned job. The rangers didn't stop at the edge and keep their distance but moved into Hamidon and began clearing the blues in a spiral from the inside. This was Sherman's March To The Nucleus and nothing was going to stop it.
I spent a minute trying to regain any sort of order in the scattered meleers before giving up. I saw an unoccupied Green firing down into the trailing edge of the rangers and flew into it. I had a minute left on Unstoppable, clicked for the extra mezz protection on the final Yellow attack, and held it's attention off of the group. I called for a Recall Friend just before Unstoppable began to blink and rode out the crash from the sidelines (I hid behind a rock to be safe from fire before I realized I didn't have to do that anymore ). I got everything turned on again and stood off to take a look at things.
The Taunt team was surviving just fine standing in the Goo and everyone else seemed to be ignoring the nucleus for the moment. The Blues were already halfway cleared. Every mito was swarmed by fliers who they couldn't seem to stop. A few Corruptors were flying between spots putting Mezz protections and heals on the attackers and debuffs on the Mitos.
Have you ever been on one of those really good PuGs? Where you don't know anyone else in the group and neither do they but they know their own characters and what they can do? Where no one ends up giving orders but when someone sees where they might be needed they just go and do it and support the whole team?
Now imagine that with about 35 people.
Have you ever been in Siren's Call when there's a large number of roughly equally divided players? Where there's almost constant motion between the dogfights with enemies and allies flying in different directions through your field of vision? Where a spot you might be needed in appears, disappears, and shifts from moment to moment?
Now imagine that as a PVE experience.
Hamidon is modeled after some nightmarish giant Amoeba. Watching from the outside it looked like Hamidon was being engulfed and devoured by the Villains rather than the reverse.
The last Blue went down in short order and there was enough of a break for cheers and enough realization we were too scattered for Lemur to call everyone to gather on one side of the Cytoplasm. I sent a tell to Lemur asking if we were going to stop for any of the tests on the Greens that we'd planned for. He replied that there was no way we were going to get people to stop with them in this mood and this much excitement. I'd already agreed with him before I asked. The mob began to retrace its path through the Goo for the Greens. Determined to get -some- testing in I yelled in Request for any other Super Strengths in the Abyss. I got one reply, located him in the swarm, and led him around to the far side away from everyone else. We attacked a Green, seeing if the holds from two Knockout Blows was enough to drop the resistance shield. My Unstoppable click was still recharging and the Green took me to 25% health before I could set it off. We couldn't hurt the Green until some annoymous Dominator(s) reached us from below and then we killed it quickly.
The last greens were destroyed shortly after and half the people pulled out while the other half went to the nucleus. Yells in Request and Broadcast got most of the rest out so we could reorganize. I was in the Goo sending tells to individual players who hadn't noticed they were mostly alone beating on the nucleus when the last mapserver hit us. Unlike the others, everyone DCed and had to relog this time.
When we came back the zone had reset and our Hamidon was gone. There were cries of frustration (not least of which from me) and then congratulations and approvals all around for how well we'd ultimately done.
Observations:<ul type="square">[*]I had two minutes on one Unstoppable (3 slotted for recharge), used Force of Nature for extra recharge against the last Yellow, used Hasten at the same time and again during the interrim, spent about half the time in the Slow of the Goo, and was through the next Unstoppable when the last Green was down. So between the first shot on a Blue to the defeat of the last green was somewhere around 10 minutes.
[*]The hold protection on a Green is at least 6. Two Knockout Blows with magnitude 3 holds, applied within 2 seconds of one another (KoBs activation time) were insufficient to drop the resistance shield.
[*]Fire_Ice managed to drop Snow Storm on all three types of Mito. What the actual debuff effect was we are not sure of. But normally auto-hit debuffs will at least land on them.
[*]During the attack on the Greens Lemur dropped Carrion Creepers on one of the Mitos. But he couldn't stop to watch it. I saw it already lashing about but had to keep going to put out other fires. Wintersthaw whom I spoke to later saw it but was too busy to pay attention to it either. If it was not defeated and the Green it was attacking was simply destroyed we woudn't have been able to see the 'bramble' animation under the water. So, it lived for "a bit" but we don't know how long. It makes me wonder though if it's only the 'Special' damage from the Yellows, Blues, and Nucleus that shoots through Phase Shift and destroys Phantom Armies.
[*]Assassin strike was previously shown to not be interrupted in the Goo by Infinite Man. I was unable to use Aid Other in the Goo though.
[*]This. Was. So. Awesome.
[*]All the people who've been saying the Villains just don't have the determination to beat Hamidon are Full Of It.[/list]
Overall impressions: The Yellows feel inordinately hard at the moment. I say "feels" because I'm not sure whether they really are or lack of EoE has kept us from developing the skills to fight them. With EoE to get some extra practice in the Yellows might just feel like a nice series of EB fights. But I don't known. Regardless there is a definite sense that once the Yellows are down everything else will be downhill. The Blues I've kind of lost my fear of (without intention to pun). The slows can be annoying and you need to take basic protections against the Fear, but if you do so they're not that much trouble even without EoE. With the frustration of the Yellows making a possibly distorted contrast I'm not ready to call for a buff to them but I'm thinking about it.
Fighting the yellows seems like work right now. They're like the hard crating you have to pry off to get to the fun toy inside. Once they were gone, and even without a formal plan or stepwise organization, everyone had a blast. I don't know that anything like that final assault can happen other than Spontaneously. I hope though that Live raids can capture at least some of that feeling of constant movement, battle, and not being able to see beyond your corner of the fight but having the overall impression that your side was winning. Part of the problem with the old Hamidon runs was people having little to do but stand in place and hit one button (or just set a power on auto). This encounter at least seems to have more potential for dynamism.
The more time I spend in the Abyss the more impressed I become at how successfully egalitarian Hamidon feels. Every AT is included at more than one point. Every powerset can contribute something that makes everyone else's job easier. We've yet to see a "you win" power or one without which "you lose". Someone will jokingly bring up Oil Slick, but even as awesome as that is (and I'm delighted for all the Trick Arrow users out there), it's something that makes it less painful to do Hamidon wrong instead of something that is required to do Hamidon right.
To everyone who was there last Thursday (except the hecklers that left before the Yellows were down): You all did fantastic.
To everyone who wasn't there at all: you missed it .
I'm looking forward to going back into the Goo.
Wow. This seems like it needs its own thread. Comprehensive and well written.
I've been reading and made it to one raid so far, so I accept that what I say is not definitive, but here goes.
Mito clearing is designed so that everyone has a role, but the problem is that the roles have to be done in sequence. First the meleers have to get organized and take down the yellows, in several coordinated processes. Buffers have a role of "stand there and buff" but if you're not a meleer and you don't have buffs, get out of the way. Unless the meleers are exceptionally skilled, that's going to be a lot of waiting.
The blues make the meleers useless, but they go down in short order, so that's not bad. Greens also go down fast, and here everyone gets to be involved. The problem is the yellow phase that takes the longest and has many people sitting around with their fingers up their rears.
Then we get to hami. And it's three spawns. That are completely unavoidable, and so far appears to be no way to make happen without wiping most of the raiding part in the process. And, IMHO, that is what is going to kill hami raiding. Beyond the fact that I wonder how many people will enjoy knowing "OK, here's the part where everybody dies again", but it's three more mito phases with getting everyone organized AGAIN and getting the yellow mitos cleared AGAIN while the non-meleers wait.
My arcs are constantly shifting, just search for GadgetDon for the latest.
The world beware! I've started a blog
GadgetMania Under Attack: The Digg Lockout
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It makes me wonder though if it's only the 'Special' damage from the Yellows, Blues, and Nucleus that shoots through Phase Shift and destroys Phantom Armies.
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When the Greens still had 600' auto-shield attacks, I can confirm that they also shoot through phase
Sad that I couldn't be there 
Good job everyone!
As a member of the "Brute Suicide Squad" (no EoE for me!), I'll echo one sentiment: the melee rush can be effective, but it will require players with the proverbial patience of Job. I don't know about you, but I don't plan on some two dozen near-strangers being incredibly patient when they're forced to work together, and this plan wagers a lot of potential player rezzing time on an uncertain outcome.
I see a way to ameliorate this, however. Brutes, as Human_Being alluded to, don't start out doing Scrapper damage. Stalkers, however, can cover the "front end" rather nicely, dealing damage up front while Fury is still building. If they can sneak in "clean"--without getting hit--all the better. (So it's not likely, but, hey, every little bit helps.)
In the end, though, each and every member of a zerg-rush team like that has to accept death. And, as I alluded to, I don't think most people are going to be okay with that, especially if you can't promise you're taking the Mito with you. Debuffs could potentially make or break this; if I ran the zoo, I'd be eager to experiment there.
For the record, Tlatoani is the Nahuatl word for "speaker" or "ruler". 
Vulpy
(Edited for formatting.)
Quote:
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Newton: I observed Mercury's perihelion moving 43 arc-seconds per century more than it should. Is this WAI? --Einstein |
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For the record, Tlatoani is the Nahuatl word for "speaker" or "ruler".
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And Nahuatl is the Aztec language.
For the record, Vulpish_One/Tlatoani was one of the two, along with TopDoc, that helped me confirm the Yellow aggro range for the map on Friday.
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I've been reading and made it to one raid so far, so I accept that what I say is not definitive, but here goes.
Mito clearing is designed so that everyone has a role, but the problem is that the roles have to be done in sequence. First the meleers have to get organized and take down the yellows, in several coordinated processes. Buffers have a role of "stand there and buff" but if you're not a meleer and you don't have buffs, get out of the way. Unless the meleers are exceptionally skilled, that's going to be a lot of waiting.
The blues make the meleers useless, but they go down in short order, so that's not bad. Greens also go down fast, and here everyone gets to be involved. The problem is the yellow phase that takes the longest and has many people sitting around with their fingers up their rears.
Then we get to hami. And it's three spawns. That are completely unavoidable, and so far appears to be no way to make happen without wiping most of the raiding part in the process. And, IMHO, that is what is going to kill hami raiding. Beyond the fact that I wonder how many people will enjoy knowing "OK, here's the part where everybody dies again", but it's three more mito phases with getting everyone organized AGAIN and getting the yellow mitos cleared AGAIN while the non-meleers wait.
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I totally agree, but I feel that eventually when organization and education levels rise, this will entirely change. It's a matter of changing experimentation into process. We're still in the nebulous stages right now where we're trying to figure out just how many people we need where to get any given job done. Once we have a solid picture, and 5-6 trained people to lead the different teams, then 2 Yellow clearing teams can get their buffs in a few moments, launch, and take out their targets in turnwise fashion. Once the buff teams know where to go for taging areas, who to buff quickly, and what buffs work best, then it won't take so long to set up. Once we have a leader to run Rangers, a little skill and chutzpah will let them get into the fray much sooner. If Yellow clearing teams are taking mitos on a regular basis, then after the first strike, a hole will be opened and the Rangers can move in since the turnaround on the Meleers will keep the Yellows occupied.
Tonight at Marut's hero raid. We were reasonably close to taking out 4 Yellows with 2 teams in a single launch. We tripped up because one Transit Officer was new. Not his fault, just a matter of practice. He was fine on the second launch. However I don't doubt the feat can be duplicated. It simply takes practice.
Downtime is a problem. However when Yellow clearing by skilled leads and transit officers only takes 10minutes, then there's very little to worry about in that regard.
"Null is as much an argument "for removing the cottage rule" as the moon being round is for buying tennis shoes." -Memphis Bill
There's a few things about the whole Hami overview that are, from what I've seen, incorrect. Here's the observations that I've made during Hami testing:
<ul type="square">[*] Neither the mitos NOR Hami can overcome a tanker's standard mez shield on their own, it takes a minimum of THREE yellows to break unbuffed Unyielding. The Blues do not appear to stack mez with the yellows, I've had 2 yellows + 2 blues on me without breaking Unyielding.
[*] Hami can be tanked reliably in the same method we use now on Live provided the Greens are distracted. Hami's mez mag is NOT able to break standard mez shields.
[*] The yellows can be tanked reliably as well, one taunter/one empath can handle one yellow AND one blue indeffinately. Also, a /Regen scrapper with taunt can do the job quite nicely. Once again, Mez and KB are NOT a factor to melee mez shields unless stacked by 3 of the same type of mito.
[*] The greens CANNOT harm Phantom Army, so once the yellows & Hami are under control PA are still highly effective in tanking the greens. A Granite Armor tanker with the +Toxic RES FF bubble could also easily tank greens for a reasonable amount of time, enough for a clearing team to hold & kill off the greens.
[*] A Hami Taunt tanker hovering above Hami works well for holding his attention while PA holds the greens and the Mito team (Holders, Melee and Range damage) clears the greens. I see no reason for separate mito teams, sure some are more effective on some mitos than others but all can contribute on all of them.[/list]
That's the basics of what I've observed so far.
COH has just been murdered by NCSoft. http://www.change.org/petitions/ncso...city-of-heroes
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There's a few things about the whole Hami overview that are, from what I've seen, incorrect. Here's the observations that I've made during Hami testing:
<ul type="square">[*] Neither the mitos NOR Hami can overcome a tanker's standard mez shield on their own, it takes a minimum of THREE yellows to break unbuffed Unyielding. The Blues do not appear to stack mez with the yellows, I've had 2 yellows + 2 blues on me without breaking Unyielding.
[*] Hami can be tanked reliably in the same method we use now on Live provided the Greens are distracted. Hami's mez mag is NOT able to break standard mez shields.
[*] The yellows can be tanked reliably as well, one taunter/one empath can handle one yellow AND one blue indeffinately. Also, a /Regen scrapper with taunt can do the job quite nicely. Once again, Mez and KB are NOT a factor to melee mez shields unless stacked by 3 of the same type of mito.
[*] The greens CANNOT harm Phantom Army, so once the yellows & Hami are under control PA are still highly effective in tanking the greens. A Granite Armor tanker with the +Toxic RES FF bubble could also easily tank greens for a reasonable amount of time, enough for a clearing team to hold & kill off the greens.
[*] A Hami Taunt tanker hovering above Hami works well for holding his attention while PA holds the greens and the Mito team (Holders, Melee and Range damage) clears the greens. I see no reason for separate mito teams, sure some are more effective on some mitos than others but all can contribute on all of them.[/list]
That's the basics of what I've observed so far.
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Thanks for the input.
Blue don't break toggles, actually. The fear effect is a non-detoggling effect.
Green/Blue phase isn't a problem, actually. There's no real need for a separate green team, becuase in msot cases, the buff teams go in for bles anyway. Blue and green clearing often end up as a sort of unified phase since it's so easy.
Green and blue clearing are very simple, and while some of the information is incorrect (I WILL update at some point, promise.) A lot of the info you're adding is more strategic than synoptic. It's good, but the reason why it wasn't included was because it was outside the scope of the guide.
I should have been more particular in describing which parts of hami break phase shift. I know that the nucleus can obliterate phase shift and PA (often drawing aggro to the controller once they die). We haven't really been able to test the yellows, but reports include them as well.
I purposely didn't mention that the nucleus+greens could be tanked easily with a high tox resist tanker for the reasons in the preface.
I'm glad to hear that the mez mag might not be as high as originally thought.
Thanks for the input. I'll add it tot he update.
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There's a few things about the whole Hami overview that are, from what I've seen, incorrect. Here's the observations that I've made during Hami testing:
<ul type="square">[*] Neither the mitos NOR Hami can overcome a tanker's standard mez shield on their own, it takes a minimum of THREE yellows to break unbuffed Unyielding. The Blues do not appear to stack mez with the yellows, I've had 2 yellows + 2 blues on me without breaking Unyielding.
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If you are talking about one single shot then this is correct. Otherwise not in my experience. Aggroing a single Yellow I've been two-shot out of Unyeilding on more than one occassion. Integration has the same magnitude (10.4) and people have been two-shot stunned through that as well.
There have been times when I've been shot by a single Blue and Feared and times when I've been shot by a single Blue and not Feared. So in this case there appears to be a %Chance of Mezz instead of guarantee. It's possible that there is %Chance of Bonus Stun Mag in the Yellow Attacks and you've been fortunate.
Furthermore, if more than one Yellow is shooting at me I've been Stunned through Unyeilding and Unstoppable (total 27.7).
And finally, I've been stunned though Unyeilding in the PBAoE of a Yellow when it was shooting at someone 80' away so the Aura appears to have Mezz as well. Anyone not standing at a distance but up in their face is going to have to deal with that as well.
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<ul type="square">[*] The greens CANNOT harm Phantom Army, so once the yellows & Hami are under control PA are still highly effective in tanking the greens. A Granite Armor tanker with the +Toxic RES FF bubble could also easily tank greens for a reasonable amount of time, enough for a clearing team to hold & kill off the greens.
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According to TheGrinnz, he was shot through Phase Shift by the Greens back when they had 600' range like the Yellows (top of this page).[/list]
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PA might have built in resists too such that typed damage doesn nothing, while untyped damage pierces (i.e. Hami, Yellows, Blues) So the PA might nto be affected by tox damage, even though they get zapped by greens.
question:
Can Hammi/ or the Mitos for that matter see a stalker while hidden?
I understand they can kill thru intangibility, that tells me they can see thru to them so...... is a stalker safe running through?
THX
No. We've never seen any amount of +Stealth keep a Stalker from being seen. I have vague recollection of Iakona saying in Closed Beta that Hamidon's debuffed-to-minimum perception was greater than Stalker's stealth cap.
I do have some question about what it is that's doing the perceiving. The Yellow's will definately shoot at a Stalker. If it's all the Mitos or even just the Nucleus that has this perception then a Stalker is never going to be able to move around invisibly. If it's just the Yellows standing Sentinel, then it's conceivable a Stalker could move in hide after they are down. I've got no evidence for that though and I doubt it's set up that way.
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Would it be possible to get maps of the different aggro ranges of the mitos and Hami?
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We're working on it. We've got /loc data.
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Sweetness
Uber Talgrim - level 50 emp/dark defender
Uber Rod - level 50 dark melee/regen scrapper
Rod Valdr - level 50 invuln/SS tanker
Talgrim - level 50 ninja/dark mastermind
OMG!! Please add these costume designs now!