Info on Issue 20.5

It looks like they've put up some info on what's all in Issue 20.5.

Highlights:

1.) New Trial, of course.
2.) More Lore pets... a whole lot more! Nice!
3.) Great improvements to the Team-Up Teleporter.
4.) Account-wide items we can buy with Astral and Emp Merits.

Looks awesome!

[Hat tip to dvandom on the CoH Livejournal for spotting this]

Glad to see some info, that means it can't be too far away now.

Area of effect shield powers! Woo!

Everything else! Woo!

This looks FANTASTIC!

I'm excited to see more use for Astral and E-merits, and costumes, emotes, auras, etc., that aren't bundled into a super booster. The costume pieces that have their own auras, and the clever auras that can be used for travel powers should give us a break from complaints that all good things are locked behind booster packs.

The only thing I'm a little disappointed is that there are no regular Clockwork lore pets. I do realize that they can't have every NPC faction represented in the game but there's something so unique about those clockwork pieces. It'd be fun to match them with the veteran buff/hologram pets, too.

What do you think? Primal clockwork for lore?

Group Area Buffs make me happy in my special spot.

HOLY CRAP. That's a whole issue worth of stuff there.

Of the stuff that hasn't been previously revealed, here are my feelings...

The Good:
Account Rewards -- I play mostly on one of two characters, and the Incarnate content has led me to neglect some characters that I truly enjoy playing. Being able to earn rewards on one character and pass them along to another on the same account means that I'll be able to fill specific holes on teams, rather than just saying "But my Scrapper is the only one with the Incarnate Shifts!"

Open Leagues, and Invite In Progress -- a bonus Astral Merit and damage/recharge buff for not locking people out of a trial, and the ability to pick up extra people who may have missed the initial recruitment? Hell yes!

The (Potentially) Bad:
Group Area Buffs -- My buff characters tend to have endurance issues as it is... they're going to be chewing trays of blues with the additional endurance requirement that this "upgrade" will cause. Just ask any Mastermind who has to rebuff after bringing back a single dead pet.

EDIT: Just saw this post from Zwillinger--

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zwillinger 2 things... The buffer will not be affected, even if they are in range of the buff target. also The endurance cost does not change, so this is an across the board buff.

Okay, I no longer have any complaint about the AoE Buff upgrade.

-----

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paladin The only thing I'm a little disappointed is that there are no regular Clockwork lore pets.

I feel you. I was hoping for Freakshow, as I have two Freakshow-themed villains that would enjoy being able to call some of their homeboys in to wreck faces now and then.

Quote:

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

New Auras, some of them travel based! YAY! It's not an ice slide, but I just may be able to make that Frost Path work... (if only there was an alternate sprint power that was a slide and DIDN'T glow pink...)

And a HUGE THANK YOU to the Devs for making these available post-level 30 for anyone who has completed the Aura mission (as opposed to strictly purchasable via Astral and Empyrean Merits). So very grateful.

Group Shield Buffs! Woo hoo! Granted, I never minded the reapplication process that much, but as this will save on time better spent (IMO) blasting, I welcome it!

And even Mother Mayhem and all her "glory" get tiresome to look at after a while, so I am glad they are implementing the skip.

I'm hoping the new auras aren't incarnate only, and are account-wide unlocked..I love the look of the incarnate costume pieces, and am glad that it's an account-wide unlock, but it kinda sucks that only level 50s can wear these.

As for the aura and cape tokens, it sounds like those allow us to bypass the aura and cape missions. If so, cool! And if they are accessable through in game email, does that mean I can send them to friends?

I'm also happy with the new pet choices- perhaps I will wait before crafting the pets for my latest incarnate, as some of the new choices sound cool!

AoE buffs? HOLY **** YES.

Rainbow auras!

Rularruu pets? I-merits?...AOE SPEED BOOST?????????????????????

*HEAD EXPLODES**

YES!

This is an amazing half issue, but I'm sure all Kins will miss hearing SPD BST PLZ! every five seconds now. Please, won't somone think of the Kins?!

Wow.... I'm speechless. This... is a mid-issue release? Seriously? Because honestly this feels like Issue 21.

The new Lore pets are nice. My Crab Spider will definitely take the Arachnos ones. For my others I might trade my Seers for the Robotic Drones, we shall see.

The team up teleporter changes look good, they pretty much reflect what I asked for before. My only possible concern is that 1 Astral Merit may not be enough of a reward but we shall see.

AoE group buffs are something I have wanted for AGES so I'm thrilled to see it happen. Of course now this means I'll need to actually roll up a few characters with those sets. Hmmm... decisions, decisions.

So much awesome!!!

Most of this looks great, but I'm actually a bit unhappy with the AoE buffs change. I really have some situations where I DON'T want to be SB'd. I guess the team will have to spread out to avoid it, hard to do on a gray caves map or in Oranbega.

"Gather for SB!!!"

Anyone know what the polar lights are? I did a paragon wiki search and didn't find anything.

There's a lot of nice stuff, but little that I think is going to make a big difference to me. Notably:

New Lore pets: Indifferent. I already have Lore pets on all the characters I'm bothering to grind out, and don't see much reason to re-do 'em all from scratch. If we get some sort of Incarnate Respec, that would psyche me up a lot more for them, but otherwise, eh.

Account-wide unlocks: Again, neat, but probably not something I'll use, since the costume set doesn't unlock until 50 (still the same problem, for example as Roman stuff), but if the Emblems and Auras are cheap enough, they might be nice.

Thread vouchers: If it's just threads, then "eh". If it's all Incarnate salvage, this will actually be huge.

Buffs: Cool, but I hope they don't get a big increase in cost. Personally, I'll take single buffing to turning all shield powers into Recovery Aura-style clicks with huge Recharge and End costs.

OK thank you!