Fix lvl 14-20 'Stamina Gulch'

Endurance. Thats all its really a matter of.
I shall explain. At low levels, endurance isnt really much of an issue. You dont have that many attacks, clickies or toggles, and even then they are the lower level 'cheap' moves. Recharge and low end coast means that you can pretty much blast/scrap/mez away to your hearts content.

Once we get to about level 14, however, things get ugly. By now we're moving onto bigger attacks and having more toggles up and running. Endurance becomes more of an issue. More-so for some ATs and sets, but an issue nonetheless, when it's very easy to run out of endurance every fight.

Now, I would guess that most people by now are thinking something along the lines of "Well, slot better then!" Ok. How? I'll use the example of the DB/WP Brute I just got to 20, and at last managed to pick up Quick Recovery. Its still not slotted, being only just 20, but even that makes a HUGE difference. And, yes, she is green DO slotted for acc/end red and res/end red. There is no possible way to squeeze any more endurance use out of the build at that point.

The only character I've not run into this problem on is a /regen Scrapper. Why? Because they get QR, the superior version of Stamina, at level 4.

So, however it's done, I suggest a look at and, hopefully, a fix for the pre-20 endurance levels. Because I, for one, do not find running out of endurance every fight anywhere near approaching Fun.

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Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

Gotta play devil's advocate on this one.

Learning how to manage endurance is part of the low level game. If there were never endurance problems, newer players would never learn how to manage it, and would have a rude awakening later on when they didn't take Stamina and their end is bottoming out at level 35.

Also, before level 20 you are still a new hero or villain, and are still learnig how to effectively use your powers. Part of that is learning how to use your abilities in a more efficient, less tiring way.

The early game is extremely easy, the only challenge that exists at all is figuring out how to not run out of end. In the higher levels it is assumed that you have your endurance consumption under control and the game starts throwing more difficult things at you.

If something was introduced that made endurance a complete non-issue in the low level game, what would be introduced to make up for it? The game has already been made easier several times, via a low level accuracy boost, and an experience boost across the board. How much easier do you want it to become?

Sorry, but I really don't see low-level endurance as being a big enough issue to require any kind of fix. You don't spend all that much time below level 20, so there really isn't any reason to make it easier than it already is (which is pretty friggin' easy).

I'm not saying 'low level'. It is specifically level 14-20. And, as I said, I tried endurance management. It is, frankly, impossible at that level. The limited number of slots and the maximum being DO level enhancements means that, with pretty much the exception of /regen and certain support ATs, endurance fail is guarenteed. Which seems fairly broken to me.

I'm also not saying 'make it a non-issue'. I'm calling for it to be balanced. Stamina being a near necessity as it is has never sat well with me, but I can live with that. Being crippled in the run-up to it is a step too far, though.

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Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

Eh, never seen an issue with this so-called gulch. I can't see how it is broken or being crippled or whatever you are trying to get at.

I bring more blues (combine inspriations) or drop my vet pet or take on mobs more slowly and rest more often; or even adjust miss difficulty.; or team with a kin or a team in general and XP faster? With the bonuses to XP at those levels and patrol XP, you can get by them fast enough. The game offers ways to "fix" this. If you choose to not use them, it isn't a game issue.

14-20 is a relatively short period in my toon's life.

I see where Claws is coming from, but I still can't help but agree with Techbot.

It's true, ultimately, the well-known slow ride past those last 6 levels can be painful, but then in retrospect, not so bad. The problem I get with it is that by the time I'm lvl 16, redside of course , I'm in cap fighting a lot of CoT. CoT and their DoT will TKO my butt unless I can take them out quickly, which sometimes calls for an extra cup of end. Once 20 hits, actually no, once 21 hits and stam is slotted a bit, that's when I start to notice a difference. Personally I'd like to see heath and stamina switched places, but i can see that only working for some, but definitely not all.

Tried methods;

More blues. Combine them when I can, use them when they drop.
Slot for acc/end red and end red in general.

On the DB/WP Brute, for one, I was doing that and still out of endurance every. Single. Fight. Worse when fighting Arachnos, as thats when Mu Strikers start popping up.

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Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

Isn't that more of a problem with having (sometimes hordes of) Mu Strikers, then, as opposed to END use on the characters? That, I'd agree with, as END draining that early is just ridiculous. One NPC is able to be dealt with. Having three or four of them all hitting you, draining END repeatedly - then having the same thing in multiple spawns - is a big issue.

Heroside, there's nothing similar in scale at the same range. Yes, Outcasts have Shockers and Lead Shockers, but not full spawns that show up over and over. Arachnos isn't faced mission after mission. Clockwork come close, but frankly I don't recall END drain being anywhere near as bad as facing a bunch of Mu - and they're far more avoidable.

Perhaps the abundance of Mu and their END drain (and IIRC Recovery debuff) is what needs to be looked at first.

See my Guides and Tutorials

/Regen is pretty much the only set that can get away with it, due to the availability of Quick Recovery at level 4.
Defenders, if they team a lot (like my Empath/Psi did) also dont suffer from it so bad. Masterminds as well, if they dont take attacks I suppose. I know my Thugs/Poison was still quite end heavy, since I got the two ST gun attacks, but then again MM pets kinda of cover that for you.

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Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

The only possible thing I would be in favor of would be a slowly scaling -end redux similar to how our accuracy slowly decreases as we level up in the early levels.

Once I hit DO's, I'm slotting 2 acc, 1 end redux in my attacks and I routinely pass out blues to players on teams because they don't slot their attacks that way and are always starving for blues.

Pre-lvl 12, I tend to have endurance issues and need to rest, but unless I crank up the difficulty, I have no problems with endurance post DO's. Then again, I'm not running toggles at that level either, which is another common mistake I see.

I thought they had fixed this problem ?

They decreased the XP you need to get to the eary 20's didn't they, and that was AFTER XP smoothing, so 1 to 24 (I think its 24) is so much faster these days to when I and many of you started playing, heck I can remeber it taking me over a week to get to 12 when I first started, and wondering what these funny DO things were, wasn't the person near Ms Liberty my supplier, oh them were the days hehe.

Anyway, I digress, I thought the problem had been fixed by this, and a raft of inumerable little tweaks along the way to make the 1-20 game a hell of a lot easier than it used to be.

That's just my input on the subjest here.

Nothing to see here, move along people

Not offering a solution just wanting to raise some questions: Why have we become so comfortable with Stamina being a Must-Have power? Why is the game so much easier with Stamina? Why is a non-Stamina build basically a non-option?

As I said, just more questions and no answers but I am inclined to try and make a no Stamina build work outside of the obvious ones (MMs, Regen, ...)

Wow, this thread takes me all the way back to 2004. I can't believe we are still talking about this.

I'm pretty sure Positron said something to the effect that he would rather remove Endurance from the game entirely than give people Stamina earlier. Or maybe it was Castle, I don't remember. Someone with better search-fu than I can find it, I'm sure.

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Originally Posted by Hyperstrike English does not borrow from other languages. English follows other languages down dark alleys, hits them over the head, and rifles through their pockets for loose grammar.

I don't have such an extreme problem with endurance because I make full use of Brawl and the origin temp powers as part of my regular attack-chain, even in the 30s. Since they dropped Brawl's endurance cost to zero and the temps down to 2.08, I can always count of having two attacks ready even when I'm chugging on less than 5% my full endurance.

As far as I remember, when I shuffle between my more powerful attacks and my brawl/origin powers I've noticed a distinct drop in my endurance output, perhaps not enough to perpetually attack unslotted but I do certainly last a bit longer before having to slow down.

People often ignore Brawl and the temps because they're so weak in comparison to other powers, but the temps are useful debuffing powers that can be used at range even if you're a melee AT, if a full team of magic characters used all their temps on the same critter at once, that's -40% RES to all for eight seconds. Brawl works beautifully with the Brute AT, as it keeps up the chain of attacks to boost Fury while costing nothing to use.

You can't slot the temp powers, but if you power up Brawl enough it can turn into a pretty decent minor-damage smash that you can use anytime it's recharged, with enough recharge reductions you can fire it off almost as fast as a normal person would punch with each arm.

So in conclusion, if you haven't already considered it, try using Brawl and your origin temp more often during attack chains and you'll see a difference, especially if you flip between it and your other powers.

Brawl is something I use up to and including level 50. I'd be mad not to.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

In the teen levels of most of my characters, it seems that I am just as likely to stop to regain Health after every spawn as I am to stop to regain Endurance.

Is there a Health gulch there, too?

It seems to me that managing your Health and managing your Endurance are both things that need to be learned, and doing so in the teens makes more sense than having to learn them later.

What bothers me about it is that Staminaless builds are not a viable option. If Endurance Reduction enhancements were a much higher value, Staminaless builds that can run at a speed similar to Stamina builds might actually become a reality. Right now, triple slotting for Endurance reduction in every attack is inferior to not slotting for Endurance Reduction at all but having 3-slotted Stamina. That's not balanced well, IMHO.

WARNING: I bold names.