Ever going to be able to SB, Shield, Buff ourselves?!

Do you even know what HeroStats is? It collects the data from your play session and makes it more accessible. It *is* in-game information, "real data." It doesn't work if you don't actually play.

Are you sure you play an empath? It's quite possible to make AB perma -- I know, I helped a friend do it on her emp/dark. The math for power recharge is quite well understood, you're barking up the wrong tree with wild claims about how programs like Mids can't possibly be close to what happens in-game.

Also, you're quite clearly missing the point of Fortitude if you think the damage buff is the intent of the power. It's nice, but the defense boost from it is much more significant, especially if combined with power build up. 23-24% without PBU or 37% with it is a LOT of defense to be applied to all positions and types. To put things in perspective, a 23% defense buff to a character with no defense (i.e. a squishy) reduces their incoming damage by HALF. To a scrapper or tanker that isn't already softcapped against the enemies you're facing, it's even more potent.

There's not a single power in the game that works that way. Sure there are a few powers that cannot have their recharge affected at all, but it's an all or nothing affair -- the game engine simply doesn't allow for an arbitrary cutoff. The only hard cap on powers that can have their recharge reduced is the 400% limit on global recharge bonuses.

Are the in-game numbers where you're coming up with this 150 second limit on Adrenalin Boost? You should know that the recharge number you see when right-clicking the power and checking the info only includes enhancements -- it doesn't count global recharge buffs like Hasten or set bonuses.

Even then it's possible to get a little past that. With 3 level 50 recharge IOs it's around 150 seconds, yes. If you put in 6 level 50 recharge IOs you can somewhat push past ED and get it down to 137.5 seconds. That's a huge waste of slots, though, you're better off going for set bonuses. Try it yourself if you don't believe me.

I do this all the time on my support characters in large teams. Some of them are empaths. Many of them are not. When all you need is a moment of "being a hero" to save your team, that's what inspirations are for. Pop 3 purples, an orange or two, and congratulations, you're a tank for the next 60 seconds. Plenty of time to for the team to rez and buff up if you can recall them out of danger.

Since you clearly didn't read what I said, I'll repeat it for you, in large font, in a very, very noticeable color.

This is from playing half of an empath duo based around buffing each other with AB.

The only reason I pulled the numbers from Tomax/Mids' for my post is that I was in the middle of installing a program, so I didn't want to run CoH as well. My computer isn't that good.

And after I finished installing it, I hopped back in, and double checked. None of the numbers were wrong. You're either lying or mistaken in your claims that AB is not permable with sufficient recharge bonuses.

Originally Posted by Back Alley Brawler Did you just use "casual gamer" and "purpled-out warshade" in the same sentence?

Mine is sitting at 135 without haste.

I missed it again, can you repeat yourself with large fonts, maybe I'm not seeing it

As much as I'd love to see us given the ability to buff ourselves, I think it would be over powered in a huge way.

Would it be ? Buffer teams can be very powerful but usually it takes decent players to make that work.

Lets look at the popular whipping boy for the over powered claim empathy.

Regeneration and recovery auras are self targetable and can put you near cap both regen and recovery by themselves

Fortitude provides a 31 percent damage buff, which is about what vigilance provides when solo. Its a bit of a laugh but I am pretty sure I have seen posters in this thread make the too much damage argument before the changes to vigilance.

Adrenalin boost isn't going to add anything to what the auras are providing, capped is capped, it will give a giant recharge bonus.

Heal other has a 2.5 second animation so if you are trying to use it all the time your kill speed and dps goes out the window.

Whats left ? Clear mind ? You can't play this game for more than half an hour without realizing the mezz system is broken beyond belief. So yes this would be a game changer but its part of the game that really needs changing

Nope. Some powersets are good for teaming, others for soloing. This is by design. Buffers happen to be fantastic on teams, providing extensive force multiplication while in turn relying on the frontline damage dealers (or other buffers) for protection. Self-buffing screws with the team dynamic, giving buffers all of the offensive and defensive benefits of their own buffs without any drawbacks, which is not in any way balanced, and balance is the reason self-buffing won't happen.

Regen Aura doesn't give you anywhere near the Regen cap on its own. It'll give you 1000% when slotted with SOs. The cap is floating up somwhere around 2000% (it varies between the ATs), so AB + Regen Aura will probably net it.


Self-administred AB on top of Regen not only doubles again your Regen but it also allows you to have it up far more often. Normally you'd have Regen & Recovery less than 50% of the time with SOs and Hasten. With AB & Hasten, on an SO build, you get closer to up 2/3rds of the time, down 1/3. You also get perma AB and perma Hasten (well just about, there's about 2 seconds downtime on it). This is a prime example of force multiplication, you're not only essentially doubling the effectiveness of Regen Aura, you're making it available far more often.

Recovery Aura doesn't bring you anywhere near the Recovery cap, but the Recovery is total overkill normally, between AB and Recovery Aura you'll have infinite blue anyway, except for using Nukes. With AB on you you'll be able to recover through the -recovery part of the nuke. Recovery Aura on top is just gravy. Also a large chunk of your defenses (AB, Regen Aura & Fort) aren't clickies, so when you do crash it doesn't drop all of your defenses.

Fort doesn't only provide you 31% damage. It'll also give 25% defense to everything (no holes). Coupled with Power Build-Up that jumps to around 40% (force multiplication again). Power Build Up also gives you 80% damage to stick on the 31% from Fort (and then theres the solo bonus and Assault too potentially) which you can use with your Nuke (the one with the mildly irritating crash you're capable of Recovering through 2/3rds of the time: Edit : I'm wrong here, AB alone will let you ride through this with 1 End Mod SO in it). It'll also be recharged every 65 seconds.

Interestingly the same set which has Power Build-Up also has Force of Nature, capped Resistances to everything bar Psi. With your perma AB & Hasten you can again ride out the crash and it'll be up 120 seconds of every 270 (nearly half the time).

And you're fully mez resistant too.

A self-buffing Empath/Sonic/Power would be incredibly overpowered on just SOs, if you actually take the time to analyse the figures and how the powers will interact and buff each other.

By bad design. In a game with a declining population its a problem and and it doesn't screw with things as much as your stating more on that below.


Even 2000% only gets you up to around 90 hp/sec which puts you considerably behind the amounts a regen scrapper can achieve.

Yes I am. I really don't feel the make the players sit on their hands to accomplish a task mechanic is valid. Its especially invalid when this isn't something like Eye of the magus where having 2 people with it makes available far more often.

Recover aura brings you up to 8.51 end/sec the cap is 10.5


What you get is a regen scrapper that doesn't have good hit points and isnt doing very good damage when solo.

No, you don't. You get a low HP Regen Scrapper with softcapped defenses, 50% S/L resistances, 75% all-but-psi resistances about half the time and decent single target damage thanks to the -resist you're pumping out coupled with all the damage bonuses you have.


And that's only one example. Emp/Archery is going to be able to RoA every 15 seconds.


And I assume Controllers would have the same ability to self-buff which would be amazing for Plant in terms of AOE carnage and excellent for Illusion.

Yes you do, whats more it has crappy heals for combat purposes as well.

Have you seen the numbers on defender rain of arrows ? It takes 5 seconds to cast ?

Declining population seems like a poor excuse for throwing balance out the window. It'd probably make things worse. Unbalanced abilities are anathema to playerbase retention.

In fairness with an Empath the Defense, Damage (and some of the Regen & Recovery) they can bestow isn't limited to one character. So a self-buffing Empath would be still able to give Mr Blaster his 31% damage and 25%/40% defense. But with this suggestion they'd also be able to give themselves perma-AB and perma-Hasten (and thus more Defense and Damage and Regen for the entire team to the team cos Fort and Regen Aura will be recharging much faster).