Gratz!!! how long did some of the AV fights take?
"All right, they're on our left, they're on our right, they're in front of us, they're behind us...they can't get away this time"- Chesty Puller US Marine Corps
Just take lots of pictures while you solo Lusca.
AV fights were pretty short, usually 3-4mins
And Weatherby: click the "Defender" link on my sig, that's how I'm planning on documenting the Lusca fight on my controller as well
Good luck, Silverado!
You should measure your pylon time. Looks like you have Fire epic so I'm assuming you'll be faster than my Fire/Rad (5:38 w/ Psi epic). My record on test, after switching over the Ice epic, is like 4:10, though I could prolly go faster if I also took Bonfire. Of course Bonfire is useless on GMs and any AVs that run around (who you usually can't immob).
An Offensive Guide to Ice Melee
How many times did you have to recast Imps? I'd imagine one good GM footstomp would send the lil' basturds flying.
Stay Gold, Paragon. Stay Gold.
Nolite te bastardes carborundorum.
My advice to you is to use fraps to record the fights because I have no idea how you achieved it from screenshots alone.
Can you describe your io slotting and tactics?
My IO choices involves slotting for nearly softcapped ranged defense and near perma Hasten/AM
You shouldn't need that long. About 2 cycles of my ST chain and I got any GM/AV aggro all day long. I actually start w/my imps a bit away, get AM on them, then go start in on the target allowing for enough time to get RI/EM up, then a few attacks in before the imps catch up. Usually works out okay that way. The only tricky part afterwards is timing the GM attacks so you can get close to the imps to re-AM them w/o them getting hit.
An Offensive Guide to Ice Melee
How does the pylon not pwn the pets? are you standing at range and it just shoots at you while they do their thing?
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Wait, so if you keep the aggro yourself and stay out of melee range a GM won't use PBAoEs even if they're recharged and none of its ranged attacks are? Interesting... I assumed that they would still attack secondary targets if they had an attack that could do so ready and not one that can hit their primary target.
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Could you post a build? My fire/rad can solo SOME avs, but he was destroyed everytime I tried a GM with him
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You'd think that would be how it would be designed, but that is pretty complex.|
Originally Posted by StrykerX
Wait, so if you keep the aggro yourself and stay out of melee range a GM won't use PBAoEs even if they're recharged and none of its ranged attacks are? Interesting... I assumed that they would still attack secondary targets if they had an attack that could do so ready and not one that can hit their primary target.
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This ai hole has been used for some time in several encounters. An immob'd taunted (from range) ghost widow is a push over. I know my ranged soft capped troller gets eaten alive by most AVs if I close in and let them use Aoe's and cones, but I just stand way back in almost complete safety while my imps eat them up.
It is kind of silly to not have secondary target system to prevent such AI manipulation, but it is probably hard to implement.
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Ya know, I prolly cause myself more headaches than needed by staying within cone and other AoE ranges instead of just staying the hell back at 80'. I have this obsession w/AM'ing my imps--I should only bother w/that on just pylon time trials and just sit back and make life easier for most AV/GM fights. |
Originally Posted by Frosticus
I know my ranged soft capped troller gets eaten alive by most AVs if I close in and let them use Aoe's and cones, but I just stand way back in almost complete safety while my imps eat them up.
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An Offensive Guide to Ice Melee
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In my experience, it works like that in pretty much every MMO I've played (Asheron's Call, Anarchy Online, World of Warcraft, etc) so I've never seen it as an 'ai hole' but more of a norm. Besides, the whole point of taunting/aggro-managing is to keep the mob's attention on the stronger target (in this case, the controller himself) while your weaker damage-dealing teammates (fire imps) do their thing. Otherwise, the concept of tanks in this game and every other game would be useless/obsolete
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Originally Posted by Frosticus
You'd think that would be how it would be designed, but that is pretty complex.
This ai hole has been used for some time in several encounters. An immob'd taunted (from range) ghost widow is a push over. I know my ranged soft capped troller gets eaten alive by most AVs if I close in and let them use Aoe's and cones, but I just stand way back in almost complete safety while my imps eat them up. It is kind of silly to not have secondary target system to prevent such AI manipulation, but it is probably hard to implement. |
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Not really, since the mobs would just rotate their melee, ranged & AoE attacks all on the tank (or whoever's got the aggro), who presumably is in melee range. If there are squishies in melee range, they already get beat down from any AoE attacks directed at the tank.|
Originally Posted by Silverado
In my experience, it works like that in pretty much every MMO I've played (Asheron's Call, Anarchy Online, World of Warcraft, etc) so I've never seen it as an 'ai hole' but more of a norm. Besides, the whole point of taunting/aggro-managing is to keep the mob's attention on the stronger target (in this case, the controller himself) while your weaker damage-dealing teammates (fire imps) do their thing. Otherwise, the concept of tanks in this game and every other game would be useless/obsolete
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That only breaks down if your tanker was taunting from range while your squishies were in melee for whatever reason (say, tanking GW from range and your blappers got frisky or something). I do agree w/your general premise in that the current CoH mob AI is par for the course, but I wouldn't mind if they got a bit smarter about their attack rotations, esp if it meant our pets would also get smarter (tho they're far better than they used to be).
An Offensive Guide to Ice Melee
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Acceptance of weak design just because it is common place doesn't make it good design.|
Originally Posted by Silverado
In my experience, it works like that in pretty much every MMO I've played (Asheron's Call, Anarchy Online, World of Warcraft, etc) so I've never seen it as an 'ai hole' but more of a norm. Besides, the whole point of taunting/aggro-managing is to keep the mob's attention on the stronger target (in this case, the controller himself) while your weaker damage-dealing teammates (fire imps) do their thing. Otherwise, the concept of tanks in this game and every other game would be useless/obsolete
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I see a large difference between my fire troller sitting back at 80 ft while the AV (or w/e target) cycles one weak long range attack and ignores all of its other attacks that it could use on nearby targets and actually being taunted.
My fire troller gains all of the advantages of taunt, without actually needing to taunt to keep my squishy little damage dealers alive. When I first started speccing my fire/storm for AV encounters I jammed in both res procs and a def proc into my imps hoping to keep them standing a bit longer and also slotted up o2 boost.
Then I went out and started fighting them and usually my imps were never attacked. I lost a lot of interest in fighting AV's after that.
Basically what happens is (in my eyes) the same thing that people complain happens with some pets where they get stuck cycling one attack over and over and ignore everything else (this has been fixed quite a bit recently). It was a huge sore spot, but I guess that is the "fun" thing about pve, if it works for you it is fun, if it works against you it needs to be fixed.
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Taunting through damage, the aggro-holder (in this case the controller) is higher on the GM's hate list because he has done the most damage and must die NOW. Any single one of the fire imps hasn't done more than the GM's top threat holder, so they're ignored. If I stopped attacking (or taunting through damage) for a minute or so, the GM would immediately turn on the imps and kill them in 2 shots.|
Originally Posted by Frosticus
I see a large difference between my fire troller sitting back at 80 ft while the AV (or w/e target) cycles one weak long range attack and ignores all of its other attacks that it could use on nearby targets and actually being taunted.
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It's all within the accepted rules and logic of aggro-managing. I'm not going in with a Controller mentality, but rather with a ranged tank (and his 3 squishy damage-dealing teammates) mentality.
If you consider all this as 'poor design' and you'd rather have them just do away with the well-established concept of tanking and aggro-holding, then I suggest you switch your gaming genre and go play HALO or something.
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I'm well aware of how the hate list operates in this game and many others. If you can't see that none of the troller attacks have a "taunt" component then I can't help the discussion...|
Originally Posted by Silverado
Taunting through damage, the aggro-holder (in this case the controller) is higher on the GM's hate list because he has done the most damage and must die NOW. Any single one of the fire imps hasn't done more than the GM's top threat holder, so they're ignored. If I stopped attacking (or taunting through damage) for a minute or so, the GM would immediately turn on the imps and kill them in 2 shots.
It's all within the accepted rules and logic of aggro-managing. I'm not going in with a Controller mentality, but rather with a ranged tank (and his 3 squishy damage-dealing teammates) mentality. If you consider all this as 'poor design' and you'd rather have them just do away with the well-established concept of tanking and aggro-holding, then I suggest you switch your gaming genre and go play HALO or something. |
A (ranged) tank with three squishy teammates could work because his ranged attacks have an actual "taunt" component to them, or he could use the taunt power. This is the Ghostwidow scenario I already pointed out. One that is really easy to exploit with the -range of taunt paired with epic immob (slotted for range)
I could enter with the mentality that I'm the lord almighty, but it still wouldn't make glitching out the ai good design. "Damage taunting" is a fine mechanic except when it results in the ai glitching out and performing at less than 20% of where it is intended to operate. Even Posi saying that is WAI wouldn't convince me that it is good design because it just isn't.
It's within accepted rules that actual "taunting" holds agro even in non-logical combat configurations. It is within accepted practice that damage can as well. The fact that the latter has developed into the "industry standard" is just weak design. (emphasis on non-logical).
I put it on par with glitching out npc's so they get stuck on terrain and can't attack back. I highly doubt it was ever the intended function of the system (in any game) but rather a limitation of the system breeding necessity.
A more advanced system might utilize something like a "zonal threat" ranking to ensure that if 10 things are gnawing at your feet each doing 10 damage the ai isn't preoccupied with the single enemy doing 11 damage from far away. Especially when it means the occlusion of powerful short range attacks.
I don't play Halo. Should I? does it have non-retarded ai? I could make a few suggestions of games with even weaker ai than Cox that can be even more easily exploited as you seem to think that is good design, but I think the "if you don't like it leave" argument is pretty juvenile.
Well done as always bro! 
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Damage itself is a taunt component, if you don't believe me then try damaging a critter; see what is its reaction.|
Originally Posted by Frosticus
I'm well aware of how the hate list operates in this game and many others. If you can't see that none of the troller attacks have a "taunt" component then I can't help the discussion...
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Originally Posted by Frosticus
I don't play Halo. Should I? does it have non-retarded ai? I could make a few suggestions of games with even weaker ai than Cox that can be even more easily exploited as you seem to think that is good design, but I think the "if you don't like it leave" argument is pretty juvenile.
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Thanks, P-Forge! I look foward to seeing you achieve similar feats with your Corruptor
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Not sure where you'd point then, but my mistake, the mud you sling actually cleans things. Sometimes I forget just how high the horse can be.|
Originally Posted by Silverado
Damage itself is a taunt component, if you don't believe me then try damaging a critter; see what is its reaction.
I could point out some juvenile attitude on this thread, and it's definitely in none of my posts ----------- Thanks, P-Forge! I look foward to seeing you achieve similar feats with your Corruptor |
Anyway, gj on the takedowns, especially the GM's. Disagreement or otherwise on my personal annoyance with AI mechanics sometimes encountered in this game I've always been a fan of your work and your ability to push things to their limit.
Take care.
Thanks.
Damage helps to raise threat. Taunt helps to raise threat. Taunt generally over rides damage at it. Anyway my only wish is that I didn't know how it was all done as then it'll all be truly magical. I like people proving things though and showing why Controllers do not need a buff 
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.
Congrats on takedowns!
What mission is the Lord Recluse battle in? Doesn't look like Statesman TF...
So recently there was an arguement about which controller is best suited for the task, to which everyone blindly answered "ill/rad". While looking closely at Illusion Control and Fire Control, I started theorizing that the latter is more effective in terms of both damage and control. While Illusion has the advantage of defense (in the form of 3 indestructable taunting pets), Fire has the upper hand in offense. And in these days of IO's, the defense can be found through other means; resulting in a better, stronger, more powerful superhero =)
Most of these were done using the unofficial Scrapper rule (no temps, no insps): Fire/Rad/Fire soloing AVs and GMs
Coming soon: soloing Lusca, soloing multiple AVs at once.