[ QUOTE ]
having said that, i would not respect any empathy defender who didnt have ALL the primaries. you can make a decent empath with a selection of them, the only one a good empath doesnt need is rez. (for doesnt, read shouldn't 
)
[/ QUOTE ]
Bah, there's some people who you can't keep alive regardless of how many heals you spam out there.
(\_/)
(O.O) Bunny: Our time is coming
(> <)
[ QUOTE ]
imo, i'd rather a squishy was held than running from the battle. a hold i can clear, standing behind a brick wall whilst being followed by minions i refuse to, cause it puts the rest of the team in a compromised position if the empath is chasing squishies all over the place. As far as i recall thats a trait people get out of after they leave the hollows.
[/ QUOTE ]
ideally people will attack upon a tankers second taunt, should they attack at a point of no taunt duration they will get aggro, i prefer them to run to the tank so that the tank can pick up aggro, running far enough so minions give up chasing aint bad either. Running around me constantly getting hit can also be a compromise for the team as that person needs spam heals.
[ QUOTE ]
No offence intended to whoever it was who said they get two shotted by an AV....but my fire brute doesnt get two shotted by AV's ffs
[/ QUOTE ].
it may do once you are facing certain lvl 50 AV's in i7 but thatll come down to how you play and who you face.
[ QUOTE ]
an empath can happily keep an 8 man team alive using only heal aura, absorb pain, and heal other
[/ QUOTE ]
buffs = less heals (which is nice)i often fort someone who is in a too hot to handle situation
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Problem 2 , i find anyway is the animation time for CM is not to quick and in the middle of a big battle having to CM someone can lead to someone dying by not being able to AP or cast heal quick enough.
[/ QUOTE ]have you tried it recently? they reduced the animation a while back.
[/ QUOTE ]
action time is still action time unless they reduced it to 0 secs i cant see your point.
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
I'm in complete agreement with you Shannon with everything you've said. Buffing allows you a little grace period in which you don't have to race in with the heals. Fort is pretty easy to keep cycled, whereas CM is a bit of a pain to keep stacked on everyone when everything is a bit hecktic. I tend to jump over a tank or scrapper if I'm being aggro'd, as tanks will naturally draw aggro and scrappers tend to be beating something up which also attracts anything in pursuit.
Although I'm a bit lost as to why anyone would want to kit their empath out with 'a few attacks' seeing as both Acc & Dam is inferior to all other ATs on a Defender. Seems that its better to play a blaster and pick up Self Aid, or play a */Rad defender in which you can improve the amount of Dam that you do.
There are a few reasons to kit an empath out with a few attacks, in my opinion... here are a couple...
1) Boredom (teams are so good you have nothing to do)
2) Attacks can be defensive (i.e. energy blast knocksback, electric has tesla cage - if a blaster (etc) draws too much aggro, to be able to jump in and do something about it is great. 9 times out of 10 the empath defender will be the only one paying 100% attention to every team member. Sure you can heal/buff them but what they really need is someone to get that angry mob off their back for 5 seconds. You don't even need to slot particulrly high in order to do something useful).
I go back to something I said on the general forums a little while ago regarding "healers". If you don't take attacks and you don't heal but purely buff (which has been said a few times on this thread) what do you do 90% of the time? Buffs just aren't available ALL the time to allow you just to buff... and on a good team you certainly wont be healing...
I only ask because on good teams where all I do is buff I spend quite some time attacking and having fun with my blasts because I just don't have anything to do.
Yes, yes, empaths aren't blasters. But that doesn't mean empaths should not pick attacks from their secondaries; we have been given offensive secondary power sets for a reason.
I began picking powers from Dark Blast when I noticed the people I used to team with around late February and early March did not bother to do my missions. I had heard great stories of wonderfully written story arcs and missions, and I really wanted to experience them myself. When my teams didn't choose my missions (probably because I had outlevelled them, or they didn't consider my missions worth doing), I had to start soloing, and frankly, a basic blast and a snipe I had picked in my early 10's or so meant soloing was extremely difficult. To be able to successfully complete missions alone, I had to pick attacks, and slot them.
I haven't regretted my decisions.
im too questioning these all powerful 'healers' who look down on and attempt to belittle defenders for <gasp> using their secondaries!
Defenders who do not use all their resources to defend the team with are not welcome in my group, they are doing half of their job.
people who class their empaths as 'healers' or 'buffers' dont do the ATs job, they are doing half of the job, no other class would get away with it so why should 'healers' be any different?
Pre ED an empath could survive and add a useful component to a higher level team because nothing they did required an acc check and the heals were big enough to cover higher level hp hits - Absorb Pain was useful there.
However there were masses of threads back then calling empaths xp leechs for teaming so high and getting phat xp.
now ED is in and an empath cant cover that distance as well, thus teaming around the same range is required, this means less time needed healing as the damage incoming isnt as high, which nets a empath needing to do less healing.
in which case, what are they doing the other times? if a empath in my team sat and waited for 'something to do' then i'd kick em! they have secondaries, use em!
@ExtraGonk
Ugh...thats not what I meant. Lemmi explain as its been clearly missed. Choosing attacks (Secondries) to miss buffs/heals (Primaries) is not a very good idea.
Crystal? I did say in a previous post about 'Cherry picking' your attacks, in other words, pick and choose those attacks which work to maximum benefit for you and your team. Hence Tesla which I found invaluable during my stint to 50.
Now we have that cleared up, is it possible that we can return to the debate in hand without attempting to put words in other peoples mouths?
[ QUOTE ]
Now we have that cleared up, is it possible that we can return to the debate in hand without attempting to put words in other peoples mouths?
[/ QUOTE ]
I think the wording in the post I replied to was ambiguous then, you did say:
[ QUOTE ]
why anyone would want to kit their empath out with 'a few attacks'
[/ QUOTE ]
And I'm sorry, but to me that sounds very much like "why do empaths take attacks" and not "never take attacks instead of buffs"
On this particular thread I'm sure no one has yet spoken about the merits (or-lack-of) empath attacks, or cherry picking - sorry if I missed it!!
I also think the topic has moved off the debate in hand (it was absorb pain and moved on to clearmind..) so not sure why I should be singled out for changing the topic?
the attacks on my defender:
1 snipe = i have great psionic resistance (mindoverbody + weddingband) give me babbages alpha!
1 immobilise = stops enemies in pursuit of another/me
1 hold = see above
1 mass sleep = prevents second waves from attacking until first wave is done.
1 mass disorient = great panic button if things get out of hand for everyone
However i really dislike drawing attention to myself as i am no good dead, attacking whilst another needs help or simply having to be preoccupied with my own issues and not that of the teams.All attacks are used for defending not general damaging.
There are times when there is room to attack but they are very selective.
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
[ QUOTE ]
now ED is in and an empath cant cover that distance as well, thus teaming around the same range is required, this means less time needed healing as the damage incoming isnt as high, which nets a empath needing to do less healing.
in which case, what are they doing the other times? if a empath in my team sat and waited for 'something to do' then i'd kick em! they have secondaries, use em!
[/ QUOTE ]
Now ED is in, I'm actually busier than before on my Empath. People take more damage than they used to. They get hit more often. If I'm in a mission with a number of squishies in, doing missions where they might get mezzed, my primary can easily be a full-time job and then some! And even when I could team with people six levels over me, they were only fighting in their own level range, so they didn't really take more damage than a team at my own level would have - and I didn't even have trouble back then healing a tank way ahead of me in levels, because I had six-slotted Absorb Pain.
As far as Empaths who aren't attacking not doing anything... my Empath is built without Stamina, and with two unslotted attacks - Power Push (almost no damage, but knockback), and Air Superiority. They're defensive measures, and if I or someone else is in trouble, I can help keep a mob down so they can't do damage. But that's it - it's just not worth me attacking most of the time, because they have no damage slotted in them, and I'd quickly use up my endurance. Endurance that I need to be able to heal and buff. By giving up Stamina and my attacks, I've been able to fit in a full set of Leadership, Recall Friend, and everything from my primary, as well as a handy selection of things from my ancillary pool that help me survive and generally do better as an Empath. I have everything slotted up to improve my performance as an Empath. As is, even if I am standing around "doing nothing," I'm buffing the entire team... and even in quiet moments, I'm also keeping a close eye on everyone's health and endurance, and keeping track of who needs buffs, who needs CM. I know that personally, I'd have a much harder job keeping track of who needs what, and getting it to them on time, if I were busy blasting.
So, if you're teaming with an Empath and it looks like they're not doing a whole lot right at that moment, check the team window, and look at the buffs. If multiple people are forted, most of team's CMed, there are Leadership buffs showing, and everyone's health and endurance is doing fine? That Empath's probably a rather busy one, even if they're not using powers constantly. 
(Just to note, this is in NO way to bash those Empaths who take more attacks, because I'm well aware that what works for me, won't work well for everybody - we all have our own playstyles.)
whatever toon i play a prefer an empath to attack selectively and to be watching and adding buffs constantly, if the empath is doing that i know damn well they are really busy. If i dont see buffs happening to the right people at the right times then i'd wonder what that defenders all about and then if i see that they are attacking I will consider kicking them and getting a blaster.
A defender playing like a blaster is far less useful to the team than a blaster.
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
[ QUOTE ]
im too questioning these all powerful 'healers' who look down on and attempt to belittle defenders for <gasp> using their secondaries!
[/ QUOTE ]
Wasn't you that said it Psygon, but 3 replies to my post all following a similar thinking indicated the same thing. Apparently I am a 'powerful healer' who looks down and attempts to belittle others, rather than someone who is giving their opinion based on their own experience and advice being given to me by others. Is the above comment fair?
[ QUOTE ]
why anyone would want to kit their empath out with 'a few attacks'
[/ QUOTE ]
....as opposed to taking from their primary pool.
Sry, the above is completely my fault. I had assumed, (something one should never do) that others would fill in the rest of the sentence. I hate posting long posts because I have a tendancy to waffle and prefer to keep them short for the benefit of everyone. Back to what I actually meant, powers involving holds etc, like Telsa (which incidently we use to hold Krackon with in conjuction with a Controller while hunting in the sewer mish) is an excellent power to use for a Defender. Also Tesla is an excellent way of indicating when Hammi is held to the holding team during a raid. Knockback is also handy and so on. A Defender kitting themselves out in order to achieve something close to a blaster, a hero version of a corrupter, is just pure madness IMO. I have 4 attacks on my lvl 50, I just don't need anymore and he's been respec'd for PvP play as well.
Sometimes I see empaths acting more like blasters than healers, which personally I find a great shame because they could do far more with a blaster rather than a defender. But the choice is up to the person themselves, if they want to get most of the secondry rather than the primaries I figure that they are going to have a harder time getting their toon to a higher level, as well as have a few probs being picked up for teams. Empathy primary is for team play, and teams rather have the buffs and heals rather than gimped dam output.
I'll stick my oar back into this thread as it's still going.
I played an Energy/Energy Blaster to 50, soloed a lot, grouped a lot. Loved it.
Now Moonlit Shadow, my Empath, is level 30. She has all 8 currently available primary powers, and only 2 attacks. She has Assault and Tactics, plus Recall Friend.
When I join a big team, I know I can keep the majority Fort'd, put CM on the Defenders/Blasters, use all 3 heals at my disposal, and drop RA/RegenA when necessary. In a big team, I'm not really there to blast, and if I do, my endurance drains fast. But if we've all been buffed, then I'll make some use of my endurance recovery by popping a red and a yellow and getting stuck in, still mindful of the teams health/endurance and status.
It's a lot more work than being a Blaster, and in many ways, much more rewarding.
[ QUOTE ]
Problem 2 , i find anyway is the animation time for CM is not to quick and in the middle of a big battle having to CM someone can lead to someone dying by not being able to AP or cast heal quick enough.
[/ QUOTE ]have you tried it recently? they reduced the animation a while back.