As far as I can tell, Afterburner doesn't give you a direct boost to FlySpeed. It gives you a boost to Fly, which is used along with FlySpeed to calculate how fast you can move when flying. (It also gives you a good amount of Defense, and it raises the cap on your flight speed.)
Considering Hover already has higher than normal Fly magnitude, Afterburner may not do much to combo with Hover. I'm not entirely sure, though. Have you tried looking at the Combat Attributes window to see what your final flight speed is?
http://www.fimfiction.net/story/36641/My-Little-Exalt
The main thing Afterburner does is increase the Flight Speed *CAP*. This is not terribly helpful for hover (although it also gives you a big +Def bonus, which could be used as a panic button along with purple inspirations, I guess), but the speed that the Fly power grants is greater than the cap by default. Thus, using Afterburner along with Fly results in about 20 MPH or so extra speed.
I took Afterburner at level 20 on my new blaster, below is all that I can tell you from trying it out:
- It increased my flight speed from approximately 45 mph to 60 mph
- It increased my hover speed from approximately 21 mph to 24 mph
- It increased my defense by 10.5
- It flagged me as 'only affecting self'
- It added a graphic effect to my screen, which looked like an attempt at a shock wave
My impressions:
- The shock wave graphic is ugly
- It didn't feel faster, I had to look at the real numbers to determine that I was going faster
Comparison: My hover board allows me to fly approximately 55 mph at level 20.
At level 44 I got the following numbers:
Unslotted Fly: capped at 56mph
Unslotted Afterburner w/Fly: 69mph not capped (that speed is from memory)
Slotted a level 45 Flight enhancement in Afterburner: no change in speed
Slotted a level 45 Flight enhancement in Fly: 77mph capped
I didn't go about it scientifically but those are my results. I didn't notice any change in Hover with or without Afterburner but maybe I wasn't paying close enough attention.
I "felt" the increase in speed immediately, especially in enclosed spaces. I also noticed that afterburner adds hover-type maneuverability - i.e. I was stopping on a dime and taking sharp corners without the usual coasting slide you usually get with Fly alone.
Afterburner is not going to make a noticeable difference for Hover. On my lvl 50 my flight-cap is 56.something mph. With Afterburner 1-slotted with a 43% Flightspeed IO it raises my flight cap to 79.64 mph.
The power description on this is totally unhelpful. "Increases flightcap by 1." I plan on testing with different slot #'s and see if I could push it to 112mph. Just haven't gotten around to the respec and pencilwork yet.
Ok after a little testing I have the following information.
- My lvl 50 with Fly and Swift un-slotted (no enhancements) is already at the FlightCap of 58.53 mph. From now on I will be leaving Swift and Fly off because it only affects +FlySpeed and not the FlightCap. Assume Fly is 3 slotted with S0's and Swift is 1-slotted with SO's. All the Afterburner numbers where blue indicating I was at the cap. I did have one unrecorded test where Afterburner raised my FlySpeed to a green number but that was with Fly un-slotted.
- Afterburner un-slotted boosts the FlightCap to 70.69 mph.
-Afterburner 1-slotted with a SO raises the FlightCap to 77.72 mph
-Afterburner 3-slotted with SO's raises the FlightCap to 86.55 mph.
-Afterburner 3-slotted with IO's raises the FlightCap to 87.14 mph.
All SO's and IO's where at lvl 50.
The uses I found for it are:
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All in all if you're looking for a place to stick a LotG and you have hover and fly already this is a convenient option. It noticeably shortens travel times across vast distances. The token defense while it's active doesn't hurt and the flight control is nice when you're trying to zip from clicky to clicky without the drift interrupting you on some outdoor maps or patrols.
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LotG mule :P Increased Flight Control (Basically fly wont have that drifty/slidey feel) Defense boost when traveling (may not be as useful outside but in mission maps without alot of head room it makes for a decent defensive power if you bite off more than you can chew and have to retreat) |
Jem - Ill/Rad Controller Lv 50+3 Nic - Mind/Psi Dominator Lv 50+3 Lady Liberation - Invuln/SS Tanker Lv 50+1 Invicitx - Demon/Pain Mastermind Lv 50+1 Celeste - Emp/Arch Defender Lv 50+1 Nightsilver - DB/WP Scrapper Lv 34 Dusk Howl - StJ/Regen Brute Lv 32 Kyriani - Time/Energy Defender Lv 41Psifire - FF/Psi Defender Lv 50
Star Lighter - LB/LA Peacebringer Lv 30
I might be in the minority, but I love Flight on many of my characters, even if it's slower than other travel powers. And I was delighted when I got "City Traveller" back in the day because I could dump Hover, since it's rare that I have to fly and fight for too long. Now everybody can jump directly to "Fly" though, too!
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Thank you VERY much for doing and posting the research here, since I've been wondering about the numbers. Reading the results, though -- I think I'll have to pass on taking the power. I'm sure I could have sacrificed ONE extra power from some of my character's builds for a 20-30% flight speed increase, but using up two power picks AND three slots for a 50% increase doesn't seem very cost-effective to me. Other's mileage may vary. |
Originally Posted by Frostbiter
- Afterburner un-slotted boosts the FlightCap to 70.69 mph.
-Afterburner 1-slotted with a SO raises the FlightCap to 77.72 mph -Afterburner 3-slotted with SO's raises the FlightCap to 86.55 mph. -Afterburner 3-slotted with IO's raises the FlightCap to 87.14 mph. All SO's and IO's where at lvl 50. |
"But it wasn't anything some purples and oranges and lots of screaming in fear couldn't handle." -- Werner
30 level 50's: 12 scrappers, 7 other random melee types, 11 blaster/blapper/support squishies, two accounts, and a TON of altitis since 4/28/04
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Whether the power is worth it or not is subjective; in a game where travel powers in general have grown progressively less attractive for the last several years, I certainly wouldn't tell you you're wrong to skip out on Afterburner.|
Originally Posted by Eldorado
Thank you VERY much for doing and posting the research here, since I've been wondering about the numbers. Reading the results, though -- I think I'll have to pass on taking the power. I'm sure I could have sacrificed ONE extra power from some of my character's builds for a 20-30% flight speed increase, but using up two power picks AND three slots for a 50% increase doesn't seem very cost-effective to me. Other's mileage may vary.
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But it's more like a 50% increase in max Flight speed, and if you use IOs (at level 50), you only need to put two slots (and the default slot in Fly) to cap out at ~88 MPH.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze
Nice build
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I've more or less decided that I might try Afterburner on a future character but I just don't see its benefit being great enough to justify trying to "reverse-engineer" it back into one of my long established characters. To me it's an interesting option - not a "must have" thing.
Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀
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I think I'm with you on the "only two slots and IO's to cap it part. On the lower end and not using slots, I'll admit that there's a good chance that I'm missing some of the finer points of COH math, but if I'm doing it right(?): |
Originally Posted by Obitus
But it's more like a 50% increase in max Flight speed, and if you use IOs (at level 50), you only need to put two slots (and the default slot in Fly) to cap out at ~88 MPH.
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IF base Fly + Swift unslotted caps out at 58.53 mph, then wouldn't +10% be 58.53 + 5.853 or 64.38 mph?
If that's right, then 64.38 + 5.853 = 70.26 would be +20%, which is awfully close to the 70.69 listed. In reality, who's going to leave the default slot empty? So we'll ignore the +20% part!
Then 70.26 + 5.853 = 76.09, which is pretty close to the listed one SO at 77.72 mph.
So that's +30% if I take Hover AND Afterburner and drop an SO in the default slot -- I'm guessing even more if I use an IO -- but I still have to take three powers instead of one to achieve that. (From there, one extra slot -- not two as I'd said -- to hit the 50% IS kind of inconsequential.)
"But it wasn't anything some purples and oranges and lots of screaming in fear couldn't handle." -- Werner
30 level 50's: 12 scrappers, 7 other random melee types, 11 blaster/blapper/support squishies, two accounts, and a TON of altitis since 4/28/04
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This, I'll pick up the new Tier 5 powers on new toons that it feels appropriate for, I'm not going to bother respeccing into them though. Unless I just really fall in love with one.
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Originally Posted by Lothic
I've more or less decided that I might try Afterburner on a future character but I just don't see its benefit being great enough to justify trying to "reverse-engineer" it back into one of my long established characters. To me it's an interesting option - not a "must have" thing.
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Maestro Mavius - Infinity
Capt. Biohazrd - PCSAR
Talsor Tech - Talsorian Guard
Keep Calm & Chive On!
My gripe is not so much the power picks or slotting. Some of my toons can take the hit others cant.
My gripe is having to use two buttons to turn it on and off. What a pain.
I dont get the need for the 'can only affect self' limitation either. Without that it could just passively boost fly and be a one click travel power. I suppose the defense boost would need to be lowered as the min/max crowd would all mass change to fly/afterburner to softcap... and I would be OK with that.
Maybe I'm just not using it correctly, but....I don't see any point in taking 'Afterburner'.
I have a toon who has 'Hover' & 'Air Superiority' so I decided to take 'Afterburner'. Upon firing it up while hovering, I saw no change to my flight speed when 'Hover' was on. Does it just affect 'Fly' or did I do something wrong?