Individual problematic powers: How/why

Name some of the powers that you generally find problematic on custom mobs. The main issue is the exact reason on what makes them bad. I'm contemplating making a few challenging enemies but I'm trying to make them challenging with a unique quirk but finding the right way to balance them. Granted, I'm the nut who proudly has Dimension Shift on one of my Dominators and wants to give my Blaster Group Fly so I'm sure at least one of these "don't you dare" powers will be picked.

Also, I know some of these wildly fluctuate based on rank. Minions with Regen or Willpower on Standard are sort of weak while AVs with it are vicious. Speaking of which, someone mentioned on the MA Arc Finder channel that there was a decent arc where the final AV actually had Ninjitsu as the secondary and I'm incredibly curious. Anyone know what arc it is?

Heat Exaust

Stacking Artic Air

Stacking Ice Slick

Mobs of enemy groups with web grenade

Energy Transfer

Short Circuit

Mobs of Empathy enemies.

On top of those already mentioned, I have a particular loathing for:

- Caltrops (when stacked)
- Smoke Grenades (when stacked)
- Build Up

While there are a few enemies in dev-created content that use Caltrops and Smoke Grenade, they usually don't stack them too much. And while part of the problem in using these powers on a custom mob has to do with an author who is thinking more about "it would be cool if" than "it would be more balanced if"... the fact that custom mobs don't have the same code that developer critters have to limit the ability to stack these powers within the same group seems to be an oversight that I hope will be corrected in the future.

As far as Build Up goes, I'd think it's pretty self-explanatory. It both increases the critter's chance to hit and the damage when they hit, which turns defense-based characters into Swiss cheese with a quickness.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nethergoat it's NEVER too late to pad your /ignore list!

1 werd.

Fire Control/Trick Arrow Custom mobs ftl

Build Up and Aim, for the reasons Chad mentioned. Rage even moreso, especially when it's used on a Boss, since its duration is so long. They utterly and completely bypass defense, as well as increasing damage. This is bad enough in and of itself if you're a defense based character. The reason it's especially problematic on Bosses and higher (which are the ones who have these powers on Hard) is that the best way to deal with a Boss you're having trouble with is to eat purples. These powers negate most powersets' best "tough enemy" tactic.

Power Sink, Energy Drain, that End drain power from Ice Armor. A lot of people hate End drain. What is worse, these powers are autohit.

Fire Armor on EBs or AVs, possibly even on Bosses. The Fire resistance is so high as to make these enemies take forever to kill with characters that rely exclusively on Fire damage.

Certain powers are problematic when stacked: the aforementioned Devices powers, as well as anything that debuffs. This includes toggle debuffs like Darkest Night and Rad Infection, but also the secondary effects of powersets like Ice, Dark Blast, Psi, Electric, or Sonic Blast.

Confuse and fear seem to annoy a lot of people too, because a lot of powersets don't have any protection from them.

Now the fun part of the discussion: Outside of "just don't use these" what's the best mob design counter? Set more powerful enemies to Do Not Autospawn so they don't show up as much? Make the rest of the enemy group a pushover in order to counterpoint individual strong enemies? Set up a "strong" primary/handpicked power with a weak secondary? Plot out a carefully worded suggestion forum post so that, in a similar vein to the previously scary strong War Mace critters, problem powers have adjusted numbers to not be as vicious? Throw your hands up in defeat and only use standard mobs?

Mobs with Unstoppable always seem to be a huge headache for me, whether playing or authoring.

It seems like giving custom mobs any kind of mez protection makes controllers and dominators instantly enraged, too.

I agree with build up/aim as problem powers. Especially when paired with ninjitsu.

Instant Healing = Go get a beer and a pizza, you're not going to be killing this guy anytime soon.

Arctic Air, Steamy Mist, Shadowfall, and Cloak of Darkness are really problematic on anything higher than LT as without +perception these guys will disappear completely if you are more than 50 feet or so away. When you're flying around an outdoor map looking for that required enemy this gets really aggravating.

I have a few nasty critters who are designed to be either really unique or used very rarely and as such are not autospawned. In once case a DB/Ninjistu LT who is used in one arc is spawned a total of 6 times across 2 missions, often enough to give players an occasional surprise but not often enough to make them overly paranoid and aggravated.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PoliceWoman It seems like giving custom mobs any kind of mez protection makes controllers and dominators instantly enraged, too.

Remember that Minions have inherent magnitude 1 mezz protection, LTs have mag 2, Bosses have mag 3, and EBs have mag 6. AVs then have an additional mag 50 (except to Sleep) when the purple triangles point up. Adding a mezz protection power adds around 8-12 magnitude on top of all of that. An AV (who will still have purple triangles as an EB) with something like Unyielding on is essentially giving the middle finger to anyone playing a character who lives and dies by their control abilities and therefore making the arc nigh-unsoloable for most players of at least two ATs.