Older Powers

Actually, Claws, the best definition of the Cottage Rule I've seen was posted by Arcanaville. Basically, the "Cottage Rule" says that: Barring a significant balance reason, the Devs will not change a power's basic function.

Again, the Devs won't change the basic function of a power unless there is a significant balance reason for doing so. In this way, they can completely change a power and not break the cottage rule. There just needs to be a good balance reason why.

They won't change FF to resistance just because they feel like it. If there were significant balance reasons as to why a change like that were necessary, the Devs could still do it, and not break the Cottage Rule. If there was a significant balance reason, the Devs could change Energy Aura into a regen set, and not break the Cottage Rule.

Basically, all the rule keeps them from doing is changing powers without thinking them through fully first.

I know I am alone in saying this every time the topic comes up, but Minerals is so good that it's easy for a Stone Tanker to be soft-capped against Psi (using Weave and either Maneuvers or a Steadfast 3% Def IO). The other armors can be made moderately tough with set bonuses.

Being soft-capped vs Psi, as long as the other defenses are at least decent, has its uses...Psi is a weakness for many Tanker sets. And when there's not enough Psi to warrant Minerals, you can toggle over into Awesome mode (Granite).

To the people nitpicking about my example of Clarion Destiny being available to every character because it's a level 50 power, fine.

Other Support sets that offer mez protection or resistance:
Empathy/Clear Mind (protection)
Kinetics/Increase Density (protection)
Pain Domination/Enforced Morale (protection)
Poison/Antidote (protection)
Radiation Emission/Accelerate Metabolism (resistance)
Sonic Resonance/Sonic Dispersion (protection)
Thermal Radiation/Thaw (protection)
Traps/Force Field Generator (protection)

Not a single one of those sets is as limited in it's breadth of ability as Force Fields.
Sonic isn't in a great place, and neither is Pain, but neither is in a worse place than Force Fields either.
Poison wasn't great but has been significantly improved in I21 and is now average.
Radiation, Thermal, Traps, and Kinetics are all amazing sets that do multiple things for a team and do them all very well.
And of course Empathy isn't what it used to be but still boasts some of the best buffs in the game as well as the best healing throughput.

Half of the ATs in the game don't NEED mez protection, and most of the other support sets can ALSO provide it. That's more than reason enough to suggest that Force Fields needs more than +defense and one of the worst mez protection abilities to become competitive with the other Support options.

The fact that every character in the game that could actually make use of that mez protection can now get it on their own at 50 is just salt in the wounds.

From a standpoint only concerned with the relative power of the available sets, the only reason to make a Force Field character in the game right now is that Masterminds don't have access to Cold Domination.

Edit: A more targetted reply

Quote:

Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect So, since we have post-50 content, nothing else in the game exists anymore? You seem to be forgetting that there is an entire freaking game between you and the ability to have Clarion Destiny. Also, as noted, new players and returning players will not have access to IOs right away unless they choose to buy access. How exactly do you get significant defense on a Blaster, Defender, or Controller, while not using any IOs whatsoever? (Answer: you team with someone who can provide it) Saying an entire powerset is useless because we have Incarnate powers (which we can't get until we are level 50), and because we have IOs (which not everyone uses, and free players won't be able to use at all) is pretty foolish. Maybe Force Field is useless to you and your crew of IOed out Incarnates, but it is still plenty useful to the people who don't have or don't want those things. I got a couple people interested in the game while they had the $1.99 sale going. They are going to be Premium players who will not be buying access to IOs for quite a while, if ever. I rolled a FF/Sonic Defender to run with them because defense is the most useful thing I can provide them that they can't do for themselves.

Did you even read my post, Claws? Or look at my signature for that matter? My main is a /Force Field Mastermind.

Nowhere did I ever say that Force Fields is useless. I said there are a lot of ways to stack defense on a team. I never mentioned IOs either, but that does contribute to the issue, yes.
Force Fields only provides Defense to a team. When your team is at the cap, which is not hard to do considering how many of the support sets have defense buffs, large and small, how many people take maneuvers and personal defense pool powers, VEAT support abilites, and, sure, IOs, the Force Fielder has nothing left to contribute.
That's a frustrating game to play.
It's made more frustrating because, to use your own example against you, you would have done your friends a lot better by making a Cold/Sonic to support them than Force Fields. Cold provides 20% defense to everything unenhanced versus Force Fields' 25% on a Defender, but also brings a group stealth, 45% cold resistance, 30% fire resistance, 20% energy resistance, 60% slow resistance, some of the best debuffs in the game, and the Heat Loss and Frostwork buffs.
Force Fields counters all that with... a single target mag 3 intangible on a minute cooldown... PFF, an awful AoE attack, a really really awful single target positioning tool that I can't even justify calling an attack, a Repel aura, and Force Bubble.

A good day for Crimson sees him use PFF maybe once... Detention Shield zero times, speaking of which I should really respec out of it, Force Bubble once if I run a BAF trial, and Force Bolt maybe five times if I'm not doing trials.
I don't even have Repulsion Bomb or Field, neither is remotely useful at all.

So show me exactly how Force Fields pars up with it's counterpart sets.

Edit2: By the way, reading over that, I realize my post may sound a bit harsh. If so, it's because there is a LOT of undeserved attitude and snark in what I'm replying to.

I24 Proc Chance = (Enhanced Recharge + Activation Time) * (Current PPM * 1.25) / 60*(1 + .75*(.15*Radius - 0.011*Radius*(360-Arc)/30))
Single Target Radius = 0. AoE Non-Cone Arc = 360.