Infernal's pool is pretty redundant if you ask me, since nearly every archetype gets a Fire APP.
Issue 16 made me feel like this.
Warning: This poster likes to play Devil's Advocate.
I love this idea. It seems thematically sound and correct. Love it.
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I agree with this. Perhaps you could change his pool into a Hellfire pool, ala Demon Summoning.
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Originally Posted by Vanden
Infernal's pool is pretty redundant if you ask me, since nearly every archetype gets a Fire APP.
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Claiming the Isles (The Nemesis Strike Force), Arc 448371 - Rogueish action from the Prussian Prince of Automatons himself!
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Well, Soul Mastery is redundant with Dark APPs, which Corruptors and Stalkers get, and Mu Mastery is redundant with Electrical APPs, which Corruptors and Masterminds get. Not to mention all the hero APPs which already overlap with Dark or Electricity. |
Originally Posted by Vanden
Infernal's pool is pretty redundant if you ask me, since nearly every archetype gets a Fire APP.
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Honestly, if we assume the devs are planning on making the APPs Customizable, while having the Patron Pools keep their graphical thematic link to their Patrons, I don't think there is a problem. Inferno's powers could have its own special "hellfire" graphics, that would differentiate it from a "generic" Fire APP. Plus, I REALLY like the Behemoth summoning. There could even be some unique "signature" powers, like Soul Storm or Electric Shackles.
I like these sets, Inferno and Woodsman especially. My suggestion was to actually double up the Soul Mastery, Mu Mastery and Mace Mastery sets, assigning them on the hero side to Dark Watcher, Synapse and Blue Steel respectively. In the case of Blue Steel, the mace could be replaced by an additional model that added a billy club to the Arachnos Mace selections. Your summons would then be PPD, while Synapse would be associated with Longbow.
The thing is, while the rest of the powers are straightforward, the summons don't really make sense if you have a character who switches sides. You've left Arachnos and gone hero, residing in Paragon City full time, yet you still have access to a Blood Widow or Arachnobot? It would make sense to me, if the technology exists to do this, to switch the pet for an equivalent one from your "new environment".
Behemoths, Tuatha, and Coralax, though, could be found in either area and aren't part of either "side". Behemoths actually are on both sides with the Circle of Thorns. So they could be used as-is, with those three Patrons being unique to their respective sides, while their power is still available to all Alignments.
I think it'll also be faster for the devs to only have to develop two new sets (or even put off developing new hero sets until later) instead of needing to make four new complete Patrons and Sets for them.
Instead of "Patron," maybe we should go with Mentor?
I had thought that individual heroes as mentors would be too copycat of the villain stuff and came up with the idea that we should have a Vanguard Patron Pool, a Longbow Patron Pool, and a PPD Patron Pool.
The Vanguard one makes perfect sense since, with side-switching, heroes and villains pretty much have access to the same stuff now. And while Longbow and PPD Patron Pools would be good for thematic characters, I'd find it a little silly seeing villain-aligned characters running around with a PPD or Longbow pet in their arsenal.
Every one of those is a trainer, except Woodsman, who is a Trial contact. Like the villain patrons, hero patrons (Mentors? I like that!) should be contacts for their own set of arcs, and not TF/Trial/Trainer type NPCs.
I'd like to suggest Spark Blade as one. He could grant pistol attacks to melee characters, sword attacks to ranged characters, and both to support types, along with some electric-themed powers.
Other possibilities could include Martin Henri, founder of the Luddites, Max Action or one of the other members of the Civic Squad, Kadabra Kill and/or Sigil, Lady Jane leader of Dawn Patrol (Dual Pistol epics for Melee!).
Also, a Vanguard Patron, and a Cimeroran Patron, each unlocked individually, and separately from any other Patrons, that offers their missions to any character that has the appropriate badge (Member of Vanguard or Midnight Squad, respectively), regardless of their alignment.
@Roderick
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If you look at it strictly in terms of "fire pool," sure. Functionally though, not true. For example, the Mastermind fire APP has no Fire Shield, and no Mastermind APP has an area immobilization power like School of Sharks or Soul Tentacles. I have an MM who has spent his entire post-Praetorian life on the hero side. However, if I want an AoE Immobilization (which I do, because it fits my personal style of MMing), I currently have no choice but to spend time as a Villain. That's an irritating disparity in what's available on the red and blue sides.|
Originally Posted by Vanden
Infernal's pool is pretty redundant if you ask me, since nearly every archetype gets a Fire APP.
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If instead, the APPs were set up so that on the blue side I could choose either a pool with an AoE Immo or a pool with a theme I prefer (fire), that would be fine. The APPs have always been that way: sometimes you choose based on a theme, sometimes based on an especially useful power. But, as it stands today there are selections missing.
Woodsman and Luminary were the most difficult to build ... Woodsman because there aren't a lot of plant/stone powers available to substitute for duplicates, and Luminary because there aren't any light- or energy-themed mezzes. However, they do have reasonably logical pets available, which is a big consideration in designing PPP-like pools. Inferno (demons) and Ms. Liberty (Longbow) were much easier.
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
I like the concept; petitioned for something like this during GR beta when it was announced that villains would have access to PPPs and APPs without Heroes having an equivalent.
One caveat is that a character should have access to PPPs and APPs, or HPPs and APPs, but not all three at the same time. But with Villains being able to keep PPPs even after going full Hero, I'm not sure this would be feasible.
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Agreed. I tried very hard to use only powers that already exist instead of inventing new ones, anything that would require new coding or animations. Luminary/Blaster was the most difficult in that regard, since Blasters already have both Energy Blast and Energy Manipulation. In that case I borrowed a power from Peacebringers (Pulsar), but visually it fits the theme and it's not far out of line with other things Blasters can get via APP/PPP.|
Originally Posted by Jade_Dragon
I think it'll also be faster for the devs to only have to develop two new sets (or even put off developing new hero sets until later) instead of needing to make four new complete Patrons and Sets for them.
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Those were the kinds of reasons that led me toward the Vindicators, along with availability of pets. I thought about Blue Steel and PPD pets as well. As someone else suggested, faction-oriented pools (Longbow, PPD, Vanguard) is also a pretty cool idea. It's just that I'd expect the devs to have to invent lots more new powers to fill out pools with those themes. I had as priorities (1) mentors for which I could build pools functionally similar to patrons, and (2) invent as few new powers as possible.
I'd be very, very sad if they did create a new set of hero-side mentor/faction pools, and my MM still could only get an immo by being a Villain.
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
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Interesting point. On one hand, given the existence of HPPs, they could say "henceforth, you can only level or respec into PPPs/HPPs appropriate for your current side/alignment." Or instead they could simply say "you can choose PPPs/HPPs from either side as long as you have finished the corresponding required story arcs."|
Originally Posted by Obsidius
One caveat is that a character should have access to PPPs and APPs, or HPPs and APPs, but not all three at the same time. But with Villains being able to keep PPPs even after going full Hero, I'm not sure this would be feasible.
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I don't know which direction they would go with it, though instinct tells me they would lean towards the "more selections available" permissive route. GR has more or less been built on the foundation of "telling your character's story, whatever it may be" rather than forcing us to remain within certain bounds of logical consistency.
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
I've asked for something along these lines before. On a thematic level, I love the idea of Patron Power Pools (and yeah, Mentor is a cool name for the Heroic versions). I'd love to see every big-name NPC red, blue, or yellowside, and even some of the lesser known ones (Spark Blade was an excellent example) have a patron/mentor pool associated with them (obviously some of them would bleed into group associated pools, like Vanguard, PPD, Carnies, etc.)
The biggest functional difference I'd like to see from how things work now would be that in order to access the pool, you'd have to do an arc for that Patron/Mentor, similar to how Patrons were originally chosen, except that you would not be limited to one... you could do as many Patron/Mentor arcs as you wanted, getting access to a new pool for each of them. You could still only have one pool at a time in a build, but you could unlock access to as many or as few as you are interested in.
Most of the Patron Pools don't thrill me with their functionality, some pools mix well on some characters, but not all by any stretch. There's a sense of accomplishment and immersion that I get from them however that the APPs just can't match. When it comes down to it, they're a *special* pool of powers you get access to, I don't think it's a bad idea to need to do more to unlock that access than merely reaching level 41.
Dear NCsoft, if you go through with this shutdown you've guaranteed you'll not see another dime from me on any project you put out, ever.
http://xx-starhammer-xx.deviantart.com/
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I returned to this thread to make almost this exact same point, as it turns out.|
Originally Posted by Starhammer
The biggest functional difference I'd like to see from how things work now would be that in order to access the pool, you'd have to do an arc for that Patron/Mentor, similar to how Patrons were originally chosen, except that you would not be limited to one... you could do as many Patron/Mentor arcs as you wanted, getting access to a new pool for each of them. You could still only have one pool at a time in a build, but you could unlock access to as many or as few as you are interested in.
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Earlier in the thread, someone suggested the the idea of a Vanguard-themed epic pool (or less specifically, faction-themed pools). I don't think those would be a good substitute for the "Mentor" pools providing full symmetry between red and blue options. I'm still very much in support of the Vindicator-oriented HPPs/Mentors that I described. However, I do really like the idea of individually-earned 41+ epic pools.
Vanguard is probably one of the best possible examples. Their regular contacts are already 35+. They have a well-defined militant theme with some variety. They're already accessible to both blue-side and red-side characters. Mechanically, just add a new 41+ Vanguard contact to the War Zone who will give a character of any applicable AT the ability to access a new epic pool in return for completing a story arc series of tasks for Vanguard. Just like Patrons/Mentors, except only a single pool is involved and access isn't alignment-specific. From there, practically any interesting faction could have an associated 41+ contact and epic pool story arc application process. Some could be side-specific, others not. Setting aside the amount of work involved in designing/implementing/balancing new pools, the idea itself strikes me as lovely.
But I really really think we need the HPPs first.
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.
GR added new Ancillary Power Pools for Villain ATs, which was necessary or else we'd have had a situation where classically Villain ATs who had spent their entire post-Praetorian lives on the blue side had no access to an APP or PPP. Now though, we have a couple of weird asymmetries. Not only are there roughly twice the total number of epic selections for red-side characters, but APPs and PPPs do not have the same range of functional selections. For example, a Mastermind who places a high value on an area-immobilization power like School of Sharks is forced to spent time as a Villain, regardless of inclination, because none of the semi-proliferated APPs contain such a power. In the same way that the new APPs borrowed from the design of the original blue APPs, there's a need for a collection of new hero-side PPPs that reflect the structure of the original PPPs.
Granted, "Patron" isn't necessarily the best term for heroic mentors. Substitute whatever term makes the most sense to you; for now, I refer to "Hero Patron Pools" for sake of clarity. Rather than worry about which, if any, of the Freedom Phalanx would wish to have followers, I've chosen to base these HPP suggestions on the Vindicators. My expectation is that the Vindicators would be more generally willing to assume these mentor roles. They also tend to have at least a few logical options for pets. These pools are needed to restore parity to the Hero/Villain sides in terms of symmetry, theme, and functional selection. Structurally, they resemble the Villain Patron Pools in the same way that the Ancillary Pools for Villain ATs reflect the original Hero APPs, as much as possible.
The power selections are without a doubt not perfect. Avoiding duplicate powers is sometimes difficult, and some themes have fewer powers of certain types (mezzes) than others. However, I think they're a pretty good rough draft. For pets, (M) (L) (B) refer to Minion, Lieutenant, and Boss.
INFERNAL: INFERNO MASTERY
Infernal provides access to a wide array of fire-themed powers, and his advanced students receive lessons in the summoning and binding of demons. Inferno Mastery is an approximate counterpart to Leviathan Mastery, and probably the easiest to design given the wide variety of existing fire powers.
Arachnos Soldier / Arachnos Widow / Brute
Flares
Fire Cages
Fire Blast
Fire Ball
Summon Behemoth Master (L)
Mastermind
Fire Cages
Fire Breath
Incinerate
Fire Shield
Char
Dominator
Blazing Aura
Fire Shield
Fire Ball
Rise of the Phoenix
Summon Behemoth (M)
Corruptor
Fire Cages
Fire Shield
Char
Rise of the Phoenix
Summon Behemoth (M)
Stalker
Fire Blast
Blazing Bolt
Rise of the Phoenix
Char
Summon Behemoth Master (L)
Tanker
Flares
Fire Cages
Fire Blast
Fire Ball
Summon Behemoth Master (L)
Blaster
Fire Cages
Incinerate
Fire Shield
Char
Summon Behemoth Lord (B)
Controller
Combustion
Fire Breath
Fire Shield
Consume
Summon Behemoth (M)
Defender
Fire Cages
Fire Shield
Char
Rise of the Phoenix
Summon Behemoth (M)
Scrapper
Flares
Fire Blast
Fire Ball
Char
Summon Behemoth Master (L)
MS. LIBERTY: MILITIA MASTERY
As the organizer of Longbow, Ms. Liberty grants heroes access to Longbow weapons, devices, and training. Militia Mastery is an approximate counterpart to Mace Mastery, and provides an option for a firearms/devices-type HPP (especially absent from existing Mercs Mastermind options).
Arachnos Soldier / Arachnos Widow / Brute
Slug
Wide Area Web Grenade
M30 Grenade
Heavy Burst
Summon Longbow Eagle (M)
Dominator
Burst
Body Armor
M30 Grenade
Cloaking Device
Summon Longbow Officer (B) *
* Summon Longbow Officer is an Assault Rifle-type Officer without Full Auto
Corruptor
Wide Area Web Grenade
Body Armor
Cloaking Device
EMP Grenade
Summon Longbow Nullifier (L)
Mastermind
Wide Area Web Grenade
Body Armor
Buckshot
Heavy Burst
Beanbag
Stalker
Slug
Sniper Rifle
Beanbag
M30 Grenade
Summon Longbow Spec-Ops (M)
Tanker
Slug
Wide Area Web Grenade
M30 Grenade
Heavy Burst
Summon Longbow Eagle (M)
Controller
Burst
Body Armor
M30 Grenade
Cloaking Device
Summon Longbow Eagle (M)
Defender
Wide Area Web Grenade
Body Armor
Cloaking Device
Heavy Burst
Summon Longbow Nullifier (L)
Blaster
Wide Area Web Grenade
Body Armor
Heavy Burst
EMP Grenade
Summon Longbow Nullifier (L)
Scrapper
Slug
Sniper Rifle
Beanbag
M30 Grenade
Summon Longbow Eagle (M)
WOODSMAN: NATURE MASTERY
Woodsman serves as a spirit guide to those who would learn to interact with flora, fauna, and stone. Nature Mastery is a rough counterpart to Mu Mastery.
Arachnos Soldier / Arachnos Widow / Brute
Entangle
Roots
Strangler
Quicksand
Summon Tuatha Warrior (M)
Dominator
Stone Skin
Rock Armor
Stone Fist
Earth's Embrace
Summon Tuatha Bres (B)
Corruptor
Spore Burst
Rock Armor
Strangler
Spirit Tree
Summon Tuatha Champion (L)
Mastermind
Fault
Rock Armor
Roots
Tremor
Strangler
Stalker
Entangle
Hurl Boulder
Strangler
Fault
Summon Tuatha Champion (L)
Tanker
Entangle
Roots
Strangler
Quicksand
Summon Tuatha Warrior (M)
Controller
Stone Skin
Rock Armor
Stone Fist
Earth's Embrace
Summon Tuatha Warrior (M)
Defender
Spore Burst
Rock Armor
Strangler
Spirit Tree
Summon Tuatha Champion (L)
Blaster
Spore Burst
Rock Armor
Roots
Strangler
Summon Tuatha Bres (B)
Scrapper
Entangle
Hurl Boulder
Strangler
Fault
Summon Tuatha Champion (L)
LUMINARY: LIGHT MASTERY
The android Luminary teaches followers mastery of a broad collection of energy-themed abilities. Light Mastery is a thematic opposite of Soul Mastery. Because of the general lack of energy-themed mezzes, Luminary pools tend to be more damage- and boost-oriented.
Arachnos Soldier / Arachnos Widow / Brute
Power Blast
Energy Torrent
Explosive Blast
Focused Accuracy
Summon RADIANCE-Series 1 (M)
Mastermind
Energy Torrent
Temp Invulnerability
Explosive Blast
Conserve Power
Total Focus
Dominator
Physical Perfection
Temp Invulnerability
Explosive Blast
Conserve Power
Summon RADIANCE-Series 2 (L)
Corruptor
Conserve Power
Temp Invulnerability
Total Focus
Power Boost
Summon RADIANCE-Series 3 (B)
Stalker
Power Blast
Sniper Blast
Aim
Focused Accuracy
Summon RADIANCE-Series 1 (M)
* Luminary-themed android "RADIANCE" pets are same as Nightstar "SPECTRA" series skinned with Luminary's golden appearance
Tanker
Power Blast
Energy Torrent
Explosive Blast
Focused Accuracy
Summon RADIANCE-Series 1 (M)
Blaster
Brilliance *
Temp Invulnerability
Whirling Hands
Force of Nature
Summon RADIANCE-Series 2 (L)
Controller
Physical Perfection
Temp Invulnerability
Explosive Blast
Conserve Power
Summon RADIANCE-Series 2 (L)
Defender
Conserve Power
Temp Invulnerability
Total Focus
Power Boost
Summon RADIANCE-Series 3 (B)
Scrapper
Power Blast
Sniper Blast
Aim
Focused Accuracy
Summon RADIANCE-Series 1 (M)
* Brilliance is functionally equivalent to the Peacebringer power Pulsar
Please try MA arc ID 351455, "Shard Stories: Scavenger's Hunt." Originally created for the Dr. Aeon contest, it explores the wild potential of one of the City's most concept-rich but content-poor settings: the Shadow Shard.