I wouldnt say resistant to Assassin's strike but more so smashing/lethal damage. Playing past level 40 is generally "lol smashing/lethal damage" anyways so that gets worse when your -4 to the avs and such. My issue on trials really isnt that but more so not having enough aoe to take out targets outside of the judgement powers.
Bump and Grind Bane/SoA
Kenja No Ishi Earth/Empathy Controller
Legendary Sannin Ninja/Pain Mastermind
Entoxicated Ninja/PSN Mastermind
Ninja Ryukenden Kat/WP Scrapper
Hellish Thoughts Fire/PSI Dominator
Thank You Devs for Merits!!!!
The problem is more of a perception issue than a huge performance concern for the Stalker AT as a whole, but the perception is based on a numerical reality.
Will they hurt a team? No - or at any rate, no more than a bad player on any AT would hurt a team. And they can often help quite a bit. But they aren't ideal at anything, so people don't come up with a task and think, "We need a Stalker for this." You would bring a Stalker for the same reason you'd bring a Scrapper or Blaster: purely for damage.
Stalkers can deal better single-target damage over time than Scrappers, they just aren't likely to - it's based on how many teammates they have within 30' of them and in mobile situations it's probably not going to be there. But they will almost always die before a Scrapper with the same secondary and investment due simply to lower hit points and hit point cap with the same numbers otherwise. For AoE damage, the Scrapper will almost always win out because Stalker primaries - with the notable exception of Electric Melee - lost an AoE attack which was replaced with Assassin's Strike and a few Scrapper secondaries get damage auras. So the Scrapper will pretty much do more damage than the Stalker, plus is more survivable. With sufficient buffing available to ignore survivability issues, a Blaster will probably outdamage either the Stalker or Scrapper.
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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Stalker is not that bad in trials because in trials, you usually have teammates around you that can boost your Critical Rate. And by the time you are doing well in trials, you already have one of the best aoe in the game - Judgment. |
Originally Posted by dbadger1138
Hi All,
I'm considering making a Stalker to try it out, but have been cautioned from people that Stalkers are of limited use when fighting Epic Bosses, Arch-Villains and the other "Big Bads" in the game (because they apparently are highly resistant to Assassin Strike). And because of this Stalkers are at times shunned from teams doing Trials, Task Forces and other end-game content. Is this a valid concern? I'd love to hear about this from people actually playing the Archetype, as opposed to the random people in a PUG who cautioned me about Stalkers. Thanks! |
Stalker has bad reputation because Stalker used to be very bad. I used to see "hit and run" Stalkers that just pisses me off. I guess the critical bonus is to encourage stalkers to fight with the teammates.
If you want a good experience with Stalker, I highly recommend: Electricity Melee and Kinetic Melee. These two stand out the most. If you want more aoe, Spines is good but spines starts out really bad and its ST dps is low. I like Dual Blade but if you like combos, stalker's version will disappoint you.
What's left is to normalize all Assassin Strikes and improve Stalker's old sets (Claw, MA and EM)! You don't need to bring back the missing PbAoE attack. You just need to make the existing ones better! For example, make Slice a WIDER and LONGER cone.
Thanks for the responses. After reading them, I'm thinking maybe I should instead ask "Why would someone choose to play a Stalker over a Scrapper?" Other than character concept, role-playing, or a burning desire to play the first 20 levels of the villain content, of course.
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Yeah... which is why I started a thread about buffing Stalkers a long time ago (when Brute Fury was changed so that Brutes wouldn't almost always do more damage than Scrappers while having better survivability) which was followed up by a dev response (by Castle) that essentially said "we've buffed Stalkers all we're going to" - claiming that the problems were systemic. That may be true that some of the problems are systemic, but the reason that they're out of balance with the other melee ATs isn't, and that's something that could be addressed moderately easily. Maybe now that Castle has moved on things will be different, but I'm not holding my breath.|
Originally Posted by dbadger1138
Thanks for the responses. After reading them, I'm thinking maybe I should instead ask "Why would someone choose to play a Stalker over a Scrapper?" Other than character concept, role-playing, or a burning desire to play the first 20 levels of the villain content, of course.
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Realistically, they still do well. But like I said, they're never the answer to "what does this team need right now?"
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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I play them over a scrapper...because a scrapper is exactly what they look like....there are no surprise when you play one.....you know you do damage and can hit....and take damage and the usual....scrapper = hum dum typical|
Originally Posted by dbadger1138
Thanks for the responses. After reading them, I'm thinking maybe I should instead ask "Why would someone choose to play a Stalker over a Scrapper?" Other than character concept, role-playing, or a burning desire to play the first 20 levels of the villain content, of course.
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But with a stalker....you can go invisible and you can strike things with an assassin strike and sometimes kill them....you also get to sneak around and have a differing sort of power collection...you can also play like me and try to do the absolute mission minimum(For me thats getting a mission to kill a target and then killing the target but with out being noticed)ok so thats not that big of deal...and you dont get a bonus for that...probably lose exp for doing it that way too...but it does make me feel more like some ninja or super assassin.
I admit.....on the trials they do get hammered....especialy in the keys trial...the pulses make your hide go away...and low health means you get sometimes one shotted by the enemies...also the hide sometimes doesnt work on some things.....so your first and primary defense/offense is taken away which does make them seam to be bad choices...also due to their poor burst damage and slow burst damage they wont get many kill shots.
But go figure....you dont have to do the trials.....you can do them until you get whatever you are trying to get and then do other stuff.
*You know you dont have to be a villain in Preatoria...and i found being a stalker there is alot more fun..HERO STALKERS FTW!!
Hi All,
I'm considering making a Stalker to try it out, but have been cautioned from people that Stalkers are of limited use when fighting Epic Bosses, Arch-Villains and the other "Big Bads" in the game (because they apparently are highly resistant to Assassin Strike). And because of this Stalkers are at times shunned from teams doing Trials, Task Forces and other end-game content.
Is this a valid concern? I'd love to hear about this from people actually playing the Archetype, as opposed to the random people in a PUG who cautioned me about Stalkers.
Thanks!