Why the presence pool should get a 5th power

As a preamble, I conceed that a very wide variety of concepts can work with a very wide variety of playstyles in this game. As such what I'm about to suggest is very much a nice to have, not any kind of requirement... but even so:

I propose that a variety of ATs could benefit if a 5th power were added to the presence pool, and that power should be a taunt aura.

First off, lets talk about the role of tanking: Classically this is having a very high survivability such that it actually made sense for you to be the one being hit, and then (and no less important) making sure that things want to hit you rather than those two scantily clad blasters who are competing for the brass ovaries award.

Obviously CoX has an unusually wide variety of alternate team defence strategies, from debuff to control to distractions to buffing everyone on the team into tanks, but the fact remains: "heavy takes the heat, everyone else goes weapons free" is a valid, functional and very common team strategy

I'm not going to say that a taunt aura is a must have for tanking, but wow is it ever useful.

It would be especially usefull to an AT that wanted to hold maximum aggro, but found itsself with limited alternate tools for doing so.

I've played with a lot of scrappers which could easily be functionally useful as tanks, but who couldn't hold more than the alpha, except possibly by dps on a single target.

There are some almost absurdly tough MMs out there, but most of them have some limits in being able to really lock things down.

Sure Khelds get dwarf form, but a perma lightform human form has a lot of seriously under-utalized survival.

there are defenders and controllers out there who might use this

Hell, there are probably a couple broadsword/electric STALKERS out there who could use it. They probably can't fit it in their builds... but that's not my point.


So what are the downsides? Is there a serious threat that new players might miss-build horribly? I guess it's possible, but it doesn't seem likely.

Will tanks break the game by stacking too many aggro auras? I really don't see how.

Will scrappers begin to supplant tanks in their role? Some scrappers already have weak taunt auras. and can hold aggro to a modest, even reasonable degree. This will spread the balance concern to a wider variety of builds, but it won't be anything new.


Anyway, that's my thinking. Probably never happen, but who knows?

Easy enough to deal with. Model a Tier 5 Presence Pool Toggle Taunt Aura on the existing example of Rise to the Challenge (minus the Regeneration boost).

DONE.

It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...

I agree with this. I think it sounds like a great idea, and I wish that other Power Pools would get 5th tier powers also.

Only problem would be you would have to take 2 taunts (AoE and Single target) or a crappy fear power to get it.

I see that as a good balance point.

This sounds like a good idea, and since the travel pools got a 5th power, I've been thinking of what would be cool 5th powers for other pools as well. I couldn't really think of one for presence, but this sounds pretty solid. I like the idea of having RttC level taunt too, because it makes it useful for someone to hold agro, but not enough to overshadow a tank (because pool powers SHOULD be weaker than pri/sec powers).

That being said, I'm now appologizing for a minor thread jack.
What do you guys think about these 5th teir pool powers?

Fighting: Add in an auto power with mag 2 mez protection to what I consider the unsual mezzes. So confuse, fear, repel, taunt, placate, all that. And a mag 1 to the normal ones, like hold, immob, sleep, KB, stun. Reason being that this shouldn't be high enough to make all types mez immune, but it would give them a tiny bit of breathing room. And there are pool options for mez resist for all the normal types already, and even a little bit of protection, so this would stack well with those, while not overshadowing them. Maybe adjust to a 2/3 protection, because the 1/2 might not be noticeable enough.

Concealment: A ST cage attack, like phase shift on an opponent. NOT an AoE, like dim shift or black hole, because AoE wasted attacks suck. This way it's acttually usefull on relatively common situations, such as taking out a tower on STF, or an AV on multi AV fights on ITF/STF/LRSF etc. Also, it would have an impossible to perma recharge time, so you can't greive team mates. I was thinking a "One with Shield" and "Strength of Will" type recharge restriction for it. 50% uptime if you cast as soon as it's up.

Leadership: AoE regen boost. Thinking something like 50% or 100% with only half enhanceable value.

Medicine: Half of aid other's heal, double recharge time, AoE. Not sure thematically how the annimation would work, but going with the theme of the set, I would assume a relatively small radius.

Again, sorry for threadjacking, but I thought it went along with the idea of this post, because the devs would never give only one pool a 5th power without the others getting a 5th, and the ones that already did only got chosen because of the travel powers.

Oddly enough I was actually thinking about these when I went to bed last night.

Concealment: I was thinking an AoE Stealth+Def, rather like Steamy Mist or Shadow Fall, but lower power and none of the +Res, of course.

Leadership: I was thinking a toggle power that provided a little bit of recharge, some recovery and regeneration, and a little bit of Endurance reduction. Call it Optimization, or something like that. Sort of teaching one's team to be more effective in their movements and such.

Presence: As was said above, an effectless Taunt aura was what I came up with for this one.

Fighting: Was kind of torn on this one, I was thinking maybe 2-3ish mez protection, or something like Street Justice's Sweeping Cross. Pretty solid hitting strike, but as a narrow cone.

Medicine: I was thinking an AoE heal plus a small Max HP buff.

Quote:

Originally Posted by reiella Until I see something that states to the contrary, going to assume VK is right .

I would prefer to see a 5th power in Presence fix the two powers in the pool that are complete junk at the moment(the fears).

You know, the ones that aren't worth the time of day?

Have the 5th power be a substantial boost to Fear duration, either as a clicky like Power Boost, or just a moderate bonus as an auto power. Maybe have it act sort of like Domination and enable an added +1 magnitude, so they worked on anything higher than a damned minion.

The Taunt powers in Presence are good enough for what they are, the Fears are abysmal. We've asked for improvements to them for years and gotten nothing, maybe they'd finally give it to us if we spent another power on it.



Obviously I'd prefer it better if they're just make them worth using power and enhancement slots on in their own right... but I'm not holding out hope on that.

@Oathbound & @Oathbound Too

If I were to create a 5th power for the pools that don't have one yet? I'd probably create the following:

Presence:
The presence pool offers 2 very different things, Fears and Taunts. I don't think it would be fair to leave either out so I came up with:

Imposing Countenance: Passive that improves the magnitude of the fear powers by 1, provides mag 2 protection against fear and taunt and increases the range of the taunt powers by 20 yards.

Fighting:
The fighting pool is sort of like a bootleg defensive set, and as such it's missing one thing: Status Protection. So I'd add:

Strong Will: Passive that grants mag 2 protection against Hold, Sleep, Fear and Disorient.

Concealment:
The concealment pool already has many ways to make you less visible and a special utility in phase shift. I'd add:

Perceptiveness: As a master of concealment you'd also have a firm grasp of what to look for when others conceal themselves or otherwise impair your ability to see them. This power would be a passive that grants +perception bonus of about 20%, a 5% accuracy buff and 20% to-hit debuff resistance. Essentially this makes it a passive version of a power like focused accuracy but MUCH less powerful and it provides something worthwhile to grab deep in the pool when Phase Shift isn't desirable or concept fitting.

Medicine:
The Medicine pool reminds me of a bootleg empathy set and it's missing something... a dedicated buff! So I'd add:

Rejuvenate: This would be an ally only buff that grants a 100% regen and recovery buff as well as 30% regen and recovery debuff resistance for 90 seconds with a 3 min cooldown.

Leadership:
Leadership helps boost the team and self in a variety of ways but it doesn't have any resistance granting abilities so I propose:

Toughness: A pbaoe toggle aura that provides a base 4% resistance to all damage except psi

I tried to come up with ideas that seemed fitting to the pool, useful in general and/or desirable to many so as to give new ideas about how to build a particular character.

Just a FYI to the Fight Pool addendums.

Doesn't Acrobatics offer a Mag 2 Hold Protection already?

I would call the 5th tier of the Presence pool - Ballroom Blitz.

You have the ability for an unresistable 10 second period to control all aggro for 17 mobs.
It would have a long cooldown just like all the other tier 5's.

My Stalkers all already take Provoke (for using after they use Assassin's Strike), and would looove to have a Taunt aura. What is the point of having soft capped defense and/or large resists if I'm merely going to shed my aggro to an unshielded corruptor?

So, Provoke it is. A taunt aura would be handy as an option.

I agree on tier 5s, and very much like the idea of Presence getting a taunt aura, no matter how low the mag/duration is. If it's low enough that any other form of taunt, be it the power, another taunt aura or just Gauntlet, would take aggro from you then it'd be fine. Add on a high Leadership-level endurance drain and I'd even call it balanced for a Pool power.

For the other sets, here'd be my thoughts;

Fighting
Shrug it Off: A small self heal (half of the average self heal at least) with 10-30 seconds of mag 2 protection to Stun, Immobilize and Fear. A.. 90 second recharge? Maybe the ability to use it whilst mezzed to break out of it? So, when slotted it, it'd almost be like using a Respite and Break Free every 45 seconds or so.

Concealment
Hide Friend: An ally cast PBAoE placate like Smoke Bomb, letting them lose aggro as they suddenly go invisible for a short while so they can get away, maybe a small chance for a 2 second confuse on nearby enemies because they *were* going to attack your ally, but miss on account of the disappearance and hit one of their buddies. It'd need a long recharge, around 5 minutes or more, but I'd like to see it.

Leadership
Inspire: A long recharge clickie which gives all allies and yourself in a PBAoE a random medium inspiration, 60 second recharge?

Medicine
Channel Health: An interruptable ally heal toggle, like a single target Soothing Aura from Pain. Whilst toggled on, if you take any damage, move or use another power it will toggle off (though I don't know if the technology for that is in the game?). While the amount it'd heal for and how often the ticks would be is up for balance testing, I'm pretty sure the endurance cost should be pretty low on account of how easy it would be for it to be toggled off and how you are otherwise incapacitated while it's on.