Please someone tell me, why human-only PB?

The title says it all.

Now I am not unfamiliar with Kheldians, I have a lvl 50 WS and a lvl 43 PB. Both are Tri-Form. Now, to be honest, the WS was quicker and more fun, for me, to level up. The PB has been collecting dust for quite some time. I was just kind of daydreaming and was considering re-speccing into a Human-only PB and started looking at the numbers. To my consternation I discovered that the PB only does about tanker level damage coupled with approximately scrapper level resistances. It seems to make more sense to build a scrapper and get much greater damage or a tank and get better res/def.

Why is it that you, the human-only enthusiasts, prefer your version of the AT. I am willing to be convinced by your greater knowledge and experience.

All input would be most appreciated.

There's nothing wrong with looking at numbers to help you figure out whether you would enjoy a human-only PB. Still, if you look at numbers to help you figure out whether or not you would enjoy a given AT or build, then the attractions of a human-only PB (and a *lot* of other builds in the game) may never make sense to you.

On a similar note, I've never much cared for opera or hip hop. I know that others like them, I don't fully understand why because no matter how somebody might sing their praises the reasons just don't register and stick with me very well, I've reached a point where I'm fine with that, and I spend my time thinking about other things.

This is probably not the answer for which you were asking. But, maybe its the answer that makes it easiest to get on with your day.

Personally I've always been more of a Tri-Form enthusiast, so I may not be the best person to answer this. However, I've been a fairly active participant in the Kheldian forum community for a while now and I can tell you the reasons I've seen others give for opting for Human-Only. Two seem to predominate, though of course everyone's case is unique.

1) Aesthetics. In a game that has perhaps one of the best systems out there for individualizing one's appearence, using forms forces you to look like everyone else. Some players would prefer to see their costume while playing. Also in this camp are players who find one or both of the forms aesthetically unappealing and avoid them for that reason.

2) Slotting. It's no secret to anyone that's played a Kheldian or tried to build one in Mids' that slotting a Tri-Form is something of a challenge. It's a delicate balance with a large number of powers and only a standard number of slots to divide between them. Choosing to play Human-Only drops the number of powers substantially and makes slotting somewhat more straightforward.

As I said, these are just a few common reasons. There are also Human-Only enthusiasts who love their Human-Only for what it is irrespective of the above. While I personally have never liked Human-Only as much as Tri-Form, I've played with many and I know how effective it is in the right hands. This was even more true before the inherent was made to work in the forms.

I have a lvl 50 Brute, a lvl 50 Scrapper, and a lvl 50 Human Only PB. My PB is my fave, so I guess I qualify to answer you. Right now I'm running as +4, lvl +0 w. Bosses. Ran for a while at +8/+0, and while I was able to complete missions with those settings, +4 more fits my leisurely style. Regardless, my PB feels more potent than the other two in many of the same situations.

Let me just describe a typical mob encounter. I come across a large Mob. Typical opening Salvo is Buildup, Proton Scatter, Luminous Detonation, then Close in for a Solar Flare. Yes, Proton Scatter and Lum. Detonation don't do great damage, but they're AoE and can hits lots of enemies. The above 4-click exchange will often kill all minions that get hit by all three attacks.

So now I'm in the middle of the mob dealing with the leftovers. If there are many left over I'll often keep spamming the AoEs. I can take out lots of mobs this way. My PB is actually a great farming toon if that's what I wanted to do. Should my Photon Seekers be up, I'll let it go in the middle of a mob. That mini-Nuke will kill 2/3s of most mobs easily.

Should there be a boss in the mob, I'll concentrate on it with Inc. and Rad. Strike, Luminous Blasts and Solar Flare. I'm hitting it hard, and the Solar Flare is killing the surrounding minions (or KBing the tougher ones back) until I'm finished.

The whole time I'm just running around, staying roughly near the middle of the mob trying to find the best AoE positioning. My shields, heals and KB do a good job of keeping me safe (plus the occasional orange or purple if it's a bit too rough). For Mezzes, BFs are cheap to come by at higher levels. With the 3/1 Trade, I'm almost never without one, so while direct Mez protection would be nice for a Human Only, it's not a deathknell like many make it out to be. In the time it takes one BF to expire, I often kill the entire mob.

Using the above tactics, I can take out non-mezzing, non-psi mobs faster, safer, and more efficiently than my Scrapper or Brute can do. Really. Not joking. I've tried them all against the same foes for the express purpose of this comparison, and it's simply true. Why? Well, as the OP says, a PB's resistances are already compareable, but damage is much lower. That's true, but there's also much more AoE and Ranged damage, and the Damage from Inc. and Rad. Strike is nothing to sneeze at. So, less single target damage, but more damage overall because it's being delivered to lots of foes at once. And the whole time I have my pretty good defenses up. It works quite well. And should my Shields fail me a bit, I have *two* good heals. Pretty secure.

For Mezzing Bosses, there's Light Form. It last 3 minutes. If you can't take down a mezzing boss in that amount of time, you need to hang up your spurs. Indeed, while my single target damage doesn't match a scrapper or brute, it can be pretty good. I'll often take on a mezzing boss without using Light Form, instead using a single BF. Very often, they're dead before expires. I've taken down many Mezzing EBs as well.

The only foes where my Scrapper/Brute seems to do noticeably better is with Psi-damage foes, but even then my PB does alright. I've cleared the PI safeguard, incl all side-mishes, with all those psi-chunking Dark Ring Mistresess, several times.

I have a Tri-form build as my Alt, but my Human Form just feels more potent than it does. Nova does better AoE, but still falls short overall. Here's a comparison: I've attacked Roman Mobs on the Wall in Human Form, using nothing but Ranged Attacks. I just hovered above them, killing them all in a few volleys. Didn't even try to defend. Their ranged attacks can't dent my shields enough to worry about it. On my Nova, I can do a bit more damage, but I have to run away, shift and heal alot. It's never a sure thing. In Dwarf Form, yeah, I'm tougher, but God does it take forever to kill something. Human Only is tough enough, and you only have to be 'tough enough', and it kills alot faster. Again, it's pretty clear to me when one seems the most strongest in action.

Now, all of the above is primarily soloing. On teams, it just goes up. My damage is stronger, my shields are stronger. I've stood toe-to-toe with many AVs and GMs.

Finally, I'm describing play at very high levels. At lower levels, esp. pre-Light Form, I won't argue much that Scrappers and Tri-Forms might be better. But I played Human Only from level 1, and I've felt pretty strong the whole ride. At level 50, on teams, I really do feel like I'm the strongest Overall Toon on just about every team I'm on, and I'm not to shabby soloing either (which I do ALOT).

So, don't know if this will sell you on the Human PB. I'm just describing my experiences. I don't think PBs are the perfect (I've voiced some changes I think would make the AT better) but they can be very strong. Certainly are for me...

A Scrapper cannot blast his foes from a distance. Yes, I know the Blasters laugh at the "ranged is defense" argument. But that's because they are BLASTERS. You have the defenses of a Scrapper, and don't need to get into melee to deal damage. That means the ranged damage coming back at you can be reduced considerably. Plus, when you DO get into melee, you do even more damage.

Plus, no Scrapper or Tanker gets higher damage and damage resistance the more allies are on his team. A Human Form PB soloing is going to have a pretty hard time of it, a Human Form PB on a team of 8 is going to have damage much closer to the Scrapper. (and resistance much closer to the Tanker)

I certainly agree that solo, the Scrapper or Tanker (or even a Brute) is going to have an easier time of it. But a Human Form Kheldian is a challenge, you're designed around having the forms. For some, that challenge is fun, for others, it's about the power and the way they complement the abilities of the team. (Becoming more of a Scrapper/Blaster if that's what the team needs, or more of a Tanker if it doesn't)

I'm pretty sure I'm not alone when I say the whole reason for my human-only PB is thematic.

No other character type in the game exemplifies so well the idea of using light. Light armor, light ray blast, light melee attacks, it's all there. And as a customization nut, having a standard NPC for a form isn't a big draw.

• Peacebringers can fly at level 1 in Outbreak tutorial = Fun!

• Peacebringer eyes glow when they fly or punch or blast = Fun!

• Peacebringers can blast AND punch AND have shields = Fun!

• Peacebringers have pretty glowy globular force fields = Fun!

• Peacebringers can blast and punch and while protected by pretty glowy globular shields that cause their eyes to glow = Fun!

• Peacebringer make an annoying tuning fork sound effect with every glowy-eyed action they take ... okay, so this one's not so fun...

• Did I mention glowing eyes?

My human-only Peacebringer is my most-fun-to-play character. She can blast and punch, whichever I need, and has the defenses to survive. Number-wise she may not put out quite the raw damage of my top scrapper and she's prone to getting mezzed, but she's not a glass cannon like my blasters/blappers, either, and playing her in solo combat doesn't feel like I'm watching paint dry like it does with my defenders, controllers, or tanks.

For me, playing her is the closest to playing a "real" comic book superhero ... blast! zap! punch! zowie! force fields! fly! ... that COH can offer. AND her eyes glow!

"Baseball's a game, and games are supposed to be fun." -- Tom Selleck in Mr. Baseball
.

My Peacebringer was originally intended to be Human/Nova focussed, but by the 30's I found I rarely shifted to Nova Form, and that ended up being a big set mule for some extra Thunderstrikes and Positrons sets. Before the 20s, Nova Form was great, you're an AoE damage king when you enter Steel Canyon.

Like everyone's been saying, Human form was tough enough and damaging enough for most PvE content, and most importnatly, shifting forms takes too long. That was the really dissapointing part about Kheldians to be honest - I'd imagined fast-flowing combat where you could shift in and out of Nova and Dwarf without hunching over and shaking whilst rooted for 2 seconds.
Once I'd got the recharge up on Proton Scatter, Luminous Detonation and Solar Flare I found I couldn't be bothered shifting forms most of the time due to the time it took me out of combat.

BTW, Duo-ing with a Sonic Defender rocks!!

I finally nuked that damnable PB whining sound fx so I'm going to give the PB another chance. Decided against rebuilding the original and went with a new character altogether. We'll see how it pans out. It is a lot nicer with that sound gone.

Human Only PBs have more flexibility than either Tankers or Scrappers in that that can also can heal others a bit especially with the Medicine Pool and certain useful Day Jobs. It's also possible to make one that can have an effective ranged attack chain at lower levels than you can with either of those two non-epic melee based ATs. Personally I just look at it as a chance to have a Melee character of different flavor than the Tank or Scrapper power sets allow for rather than being better than them.

Thanks for the replies. It didn't really take much to convince me to try my PB again. I think I am going to start over at level 1 rather than re-spec and run a toon that is already at a high level. That way I can experience the character from start to finish.

I am no stranger to playing heroes/villains with powersets that aren't considered top tier, call it my love for the underdog. Not to say that I think the AT is underpowered, just that at first blush the numbers made me wince. Believe me, I am no min/maxer.

I play primarily for the concept and, when I do that correctly, I can see them all the way to 50.

Again, thanks for the replies and giving your reasons why human-only is a perfectly viable option. I certainly intend to try that variant.

Of course, nothing is without it's cracks... For PBs, it's Knockback. KB, while useful soloing for the mitigation, is severely unwelcome on Teams; quite an odd feature, really, for an AT that's billed as a 'Team AT'. Whatever... and don't tell me about knocking into walls, etc. "Learn to control your KB!". I do that well, but that's not the point. Don't you realize that by maneuvering around to position for Wall KB, you're effectively turning your KB into Knockdown. Again, by doing so, you're showing that you really want Knockdown, else you wouldn't be doing all that positioning to make you KB..well, not KB. Let's at least be honest about it.

But we're stuck with it, and the following is what we deal with...

Guy requesting xtras for PI Scanner mishes last night, I had an hour to kill, so why not... Sent him a Tell: "Human PB interested if you are..."
Guy: "Eeeeee...can you control your KB?"
Me: "Heh, yeah"

So he sends me an invite

Got a full team, so I'm looking forward to being at full power, although I've made a note to be extra careful with KB since the Star is already leery.

Enter mission. First several fights I pretty much use only Proton Scatter for AoE since it doesn't cause KB, concentrating on Single Target attacks for the most part, but I sure am missing Solar Flare's large AoE damage. Yeah, I know I know... position so that we KB against walls, but I didn't feel like catering to anybody at the moment. Sue me. Teams doing okay anyway, and I'm contributing as much ST damage as the Scrapper is...so no biggie. Several Mobs, several fights and I've not caused any KB issues yet. Then we get to a new mob and I accidently click Luminous Detonation instead of Proton Scatter and I send about half the mobs flying...

Guy (in teamspeak): "SS, what did I ask you before Invited you?"
Me: "I just hit the wrong attack. I've been doing quite well not causing anybody KB headaches so far."
Guy: "KB causes my AT all kinds of problems. (blah blah...procedes with rant to never do it again or else..."
Me: "It was one mistake. If I accidently cause a little bit of Scattering just once every 10 mobs or so, can't you be a little tolerant?"

Little more jawing back and forth, but I stay on the team and proceed to do several more missions with them without causing KB issues, and the Guy eventually accepts that I really do know what I'm doing. I start positioning more and throwing out Solars Flares here and there, so it's alright, but I sure wish I could cut loose more on large teams...

Incidently, the Guy was playing a Scapper that was a Tanker wannabe. Over and over, he'd go to corner, the hit some bind key "Pulling to Here!!!", then he'd gather mobs and pull them to the spot for us to attack. Double weird cuz we had an actualy Tanker on the team...*Shrug*

Yeah, perhaps he was bit odd, but I was just throwing that in there for grins. I've had many other players make little comments about KB (some humorous, some snarky), and sometimes it just hits me wrong. I really don't like having features on my 'Team AT' that makes teammates irate on any level. Sure wish there was a KB magnitude setting or toggle. Oh well, it's an old yarn...

Or just do what I do and make friends with a bunch of halfway competent controllers. I team with them all the time, and they know my playstyle well enough to make their "cages" type attack be the first one they hit, because in most cases, I'm already in the mob when they arrive.

"Alien"

Quote:

Originally Posted by Infernus_Hades The way you play changes your IO slotting..

Yea, I'm pretty sure. A good scrapper MA chain using basic IOs and no hasten can push out about 141 DPS. Cranked up to the wall on setIOs it can push out 165. (Based on the DPS results threads in the scrapper forum.)

Let's see what a PB can dish out on average given your 4 teammates buffing damage to 80% and your global damage buff of 26%. I'll assume 95% damage enhancement in each attack. This will be quick and dirty. I'll even give the PB the same ridiculous levels of recharge I used in the first thread. 250% total in Inca Strike. BU does 72% dam buff and we'll say it's up 1/3 of the time for an average buff of 24%.

Attack chain: Inca Strike, Rad Strike, Gleaming Blast, Glinting Eye
Inca: 3.56 dam in 3.3 sec - w/ melee modifier: 148.48
Rad: 1.96 dam in 1.07 sec - w/ melee modifier: 81.748
GB: 1.64 dam in 1.67 sec - w/ range modifier: 57
GE: 1 dam in 1.67 - w/ range modifier: 34.756

Oops, even at 250% recharge, Inca needs a full 5.7 seconds to recharge. Arcanatime would add some to the chain, so let's just stick a gleaming bolt on the end.

GB: .6 dam in 1 sec - w/ range modifier: 20.853

Total chain time: 8.71 seconds
Total base damage: 342.837
Add in all the buffs 106+95+24: 1114.22
DPS: 127.924

Respectable damage, true. But even to get that, all 4 of your damage buffers had to ALWAYS be in range, your current build has enough global recharge to have a 5.71 second recharge on Inca Strike AND the scrapper would have had to have a less of an IOed out build than you.

Soooo yea. Hyperbole.

Well, I've read your posts in the past, Billz, and I'm not about to get into a big numbers duel with you, but please note that I'm not comparing the average Scrapper vs. the average PB. I am comparing my PB's numbers vs. this one Scrapper's in a series of missions.

I don't know what the Scrappers IOs were, if any, but low end you're giving him around 141 DPS, and you give a PB about 128 DPS. We're close already...

Now, my PB: I've never calculated my DPS, but my PB is Purpled Out: 6-slotted Hecatombs, Apocalyspes, and all those other biblical-sounding thingies in all my major attacks. My Hasten isn't perma but its downtime is so little that I have it set to Auto. Feels like it's pretty much all the time. My 'buffer teammate were nearby pretty much constantly. We weren't fighting one AV after another where an unbroken attack chain would really matter, simply moving from one typical mob to the next.

Forget your average scrapper and PB. This was his Scrapper and my PB, and I'm not blind. I can see the numbers and I know that when they're in the hundreds, a couple dozen points difference between the two is chump change. So small it doesn't matter; same playing field, same ball park, no Hyperbole needed.

And if I'd let loose with my AoEs, my same-level damage would've been hitting 3-times more enemies that him. But...he was a high-strung anal-retentive sort of fellow, and the star, so I let him have his show.

Fair enough. The first thing that pops into my mind when I hear "I was doing the same damage as the scrapper" is "he was ignoring crits again" or "selective memory is awesome!"

I'm coming down from a bad case of "I can't stand it when people ignore facts when making a case for X" and that one line jumped out at me.

Everything you stated about folks getting overly uptight about knockback is as true now as it's always been. And there's nothing worse than a bad team leader hamstringing a player's effectiveness.

One advantage to the PB would be that a large amount of his damage could have been dished out at range, and he could also be doing more AoE damage.

Of course, the same would be true of a Blaster. Which is one reason why straight DPS comparisons between Blasters and Scrappers rarely tell the whole story.

Honestly, I never figured that a PB could do as much damage as a Scrapper, even at high levels. He will be more balanced, more soloable, and bring more of what he does best to a team. But that's typical of all ATs at high level.