Thoughts on Energy Armor changes

Another nitpick that usually people don't bother mentioning: You can get a lot more defense faster on a EA character than on a positional set barring maybe Ninjutsu.

I mean, with some clever slotting, I have a *near* capped to smash/lethal/fire/cold/energy stalker by lvl 32. He had a sizable amount of defense by lvl 18! Your SR and Shields are still needing to pick up passives and toggles while, on EA, I've got all my defense by around 26. It's not hard to cap EA nor is it really more difficult than SR or what have you. That is, to say, unless you *specifically* specify max level, certain budget, respect build...and then I'd just mention 'well, EA has a heal' so it's all right.

That said, I *REALLY* wish they would have kept the taunt out of the set. Although I'd have to play the set to get a definite feel for its changes, but they really bark of 'been there! done that!' for melee sets. It's just armor toggles, heal, aura, tier 9. At least before, it was more about the stealth. I'd have really enjoyed it if they took my idea and swapped Conserve Power for a kind of Fiery Embrace clone that added energy damage and lowered endurance costs. Then, the set would be more about concealment and offense rather than 'heard em!'. Ah well...

Nope. I can't. I have tried. I turned my difficulty down to 0 x1 no bosses and ran 1.5 tip missions. Then I had to log out because it is not CoH when I do that, it is some bizarro world "press space to win" game. It was so mind-numbingly painful for me I couldn't muster the will to log in for days afterwards.

This is just like the crafting badges for Field Crafter. I CAN'T do it. I want to do it. I have tried to do it, but after 15 to 20 minutes I can no longer function in the game. Why would I do that to myself on purpose? I occasionally try again, because my tastes could change, but so far no Field Crafter and no ability to run tips at "collect your prize" difficulty.

I do not begrudge anyone who can do it. I am at 23 H-merits. It has been awhile since I have worked at it, so I will likely soon be able to run some tips again and get some more progress. One day I will have my vanity IO, it is just gonna take awhile.

While I will personally enjoy the taunt aura, I too am surprised that stealth brute gets a taunt aura. One thing to realize is that this does not change anything while fighting. A taunt aura should not alter how the stealth works to avoid aggroing the next spawn or even a nearby enemy in the current spawn who did not aggro. Anything the taunt aura will aggro would have aggroed before just from being so close.

It is true there is some concern about running through missions past enemies now, since it is preferable not to turn off your status protection when doing so.

After all the times they've had to 'fix' Energy Aura, only for it to fall short yet again?

The Devs probably want to make sure the set is finally acceptable to players, before porting it to the AT where it is the primary power.

To resurrect a line from Statesman, early in the history of CoH:

"Concern = small tweak."

Which was followed by a major rewrite of /Regeneration.