I think the problem is not that healers are redundant, it is that most people can't play them for peanuts. And yes, I know we dont technically have a 'healer' class in Cox, but an empath is as close as we do have...and most aren't worth the team slot they take up.
Granted, I do have pretty high, perhaps unfair, standards..given that a lot of people play for fun. Maybe it comes about from experience pvp (pre i13 pvp moreso) and seeing how ONE well played emp can just make a few good players utterly awesome.
In about 4 years of play, I have seen..less than 5, emps who I would call great. Less than FIVE. And 4 of them came from pvp. I think that says alot. Of course, the way I judge a great emp (healer) wont be the same as others do, or what they are after.
Regardless of how an emp is players..the Primary IS healing and buffs..so when I see one happily spamming attacks, while their entire team goes unforted or uncm'd..And to those who say CM is a reaction buff, to be given AFTER a person is mezzed..*stab*
To illustrate my point, their is a certain emp on Freedom (yes I know, freedumb) who sits in PD bragging about having ALL 84 T4 incarnate powers..and then rocks the aura all mission. In fact, on a recent DD trial, just as we go to the final AV..'it' said..afk, lunch and proceeded to go afk, auto healing. Now, the BEST thing about it was..you actually could spot spot a difference in that persons playstyle.
I dont think healers and emps are dead..just 99% brain dead.
Somewhat depends on whether or not you are one of those "Pure Healer" types. If you are, then I agree with the premise....Empaths just aren't that relevant end-game. If you balanced secondary powers with your primary, then you still have some contributions left to make.
In many ways, a Healer is just like a real-life lifecycle. When you are young and full of energy, you've got a lot to offer. As you age (level) you enter your twilight years and people still carry you along out of respect for the contributions you once made.
Defender's Bastion: Recharge/Chance for Minor PBAoE Heal
We are all heal0rs now.
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The way I see it. If you are a truly good ____ (enter AT here), there is no need to advertise yourself. You will literally have no trouble at all with having people ask you to grab your character when they need it.|
Originally Posted by MisterD
I think the problem is not that healers are redundant, it is that most people can't play them for peanuts. And yes, I know we dont technically have a 'healer' class in Cox, but an empath is as close as we do have...and most aren't worth the team slot they take up.
Granted, I do have pretty high, perhaps unfair, standards..given that a lot of people play for fun. Maybe it comes about from experience pvp (pre i13 pvp moreso) and seeing how ONE well played emp can just make a few good players utterly awesome. In about 4 years of play, I have seen..less than 5, emps who I would call great. Less than FIVE. And 4 of them came from pvp. I think that says alot. Of course, the way I judge a great emp (healer) wont be the same as others do, or what they are after. Regardless of how an emp is players..the Primary IS healing and buffs..so when I see one happily spamming attacks, while their entire team goes unforted or uncm'd..And to those who say CM is a reaction buff, to be given AFTER a person is mezzed..*stab* To illustrate my point, their is a certain emp on Freedom (yes I know, freedumb) who sits in PD bragging about having ALL 84 T4 incarnate powers..and then rocks the aura all mission. In fact, on a recent DD trial, just as we go to the final AV..'it' said..afk, lunch and proceeded to go afk, auto healing. Now, the BEST thing about it was..you actually could spot spot a difference in that persons playstyle. I dont think healers and emps are dead..just 99% brain dead. |
And, I think I've come across this person you describe as well. Seems to be thought of very highly in certain crowds but I do think that the majority are starting to realize that that Emp's only real incarnate power is T4 BS.
@ Dr Gemini
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| �If we would come together and be great role models, it would be amazing to see how the next generation turns out.� |
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I got a chuckle out of this, while 99% might be a bit high, I definitely get the sentiment. My biggest pet peeve beyond an emp who buffs just 1 person on the team (We've all teamed with them, some random person gets fort/cm/ab, no one ever sees another buff) has to be flying emps. I'm sure people will say "My emp uses fly, and its awesome" but I couldn't begin to imagine trying for reactionary heals in a timely manner on people without SS/CJ at least. (Unless you've got a healing circle going where incandesence + aura rocking pretty much fixes all problems)|
Originally Posted by MisterD
I dont think healers and emps are dead..just 99% brain dead. |
Its funny to see someone take a good chunk of damage, be healed back up to full, then pop rebirth, because as an emp, you have that team/league window up where you can see it. Its a bit slower in iTrials outside of your team, since you can't see buff bars the league (and anticipate the damage coming in).
But yeah, I think I've teamed with maybe a half dozen people over the years playing emp who I felt really earned their spot. Not to say I won't invite anyone, just personal opinion. Its not a hardcore game, so really getting by isn't all that tough.
The one constant in every team you join is you. So whenever you think about what a buff/debuff set provides, don't try to imagine what you'll be doing for other people. Think about what it does for you.
Unfortunately far too many players spend all their time imagining what other people need - and their imagination doesn't match reality.
People simply don't structure their build around the idea that they'll have an Empathy Defender strapped to their hip. They need enough recovery to run their defenses and attack without the benefit of Recovery Aura. They need enough recharge to run their attack cycle cycle without the benefit of Adrenalin Boost. They need enough defenses to survive their fighting style without Fortitude.
And, of course, they need to take a small enough amount of damage that they can operate without Absorb Pain.
Now, builds like this were impossible in the original CoH and still are at low levels. But past the DFB levels, Empathy Defenders will increasingly find their role to be as a Blaster rather than a 'healer'. And Empathy is horrible self-support for a Blaster. It has decent self-healing, a bit of extra self-recovery, and that's it.
Now take that same Empathy Defender and flip them into a Pain Domination Corruptor. You've got the same self-healing benefit. But you've also got a host of +damage abilities some additional resistance and -def/-res debuffs - and it's coupled to much greater native firepower.
I think another problem is that the good healers and emps simply dont get the credit. Sure, I KNOW my emp is a complete ninja and keeping the team alive, but it is still really nice and satisfying when the blaster, tank or whatever actually says thank you....instead of just acting like its all them.
Added to that is the general assumption that you NEED to do damage in the trails to get rewards...which is clearly proven false by my previous example of the heal spammers with 84 T4 powers.
Going back to the Destiny discussion though..said it before, the Destiny powers should never have been full 255 person aoes. Or at least not full strength aoe. Of course, this is tempered by the fact that most people on trails (me included generally) are 100% selfish about when to use them. You know the type..start of a baf, the first guy up there just HAS to pop his barrier when he is alone, instead of waiting for a few other people.
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Hence the reason that I have been saying, keep saying, and will keep believing that Empathy needs a revisit of its powers (with an eye towards the solo-ability). Added to this list are a couple of other powersets like Sonic. The devs can put up flashscreen messages about some powersets being more suited to group play all they want, but eventually the only empaths around will be new players coming from traditional MMOs where healers are 'THE' support style, or dusty 'shelved' toons that the player in charge has moved on to some other 'well-balanced' for group AND solo play character.|
Originally Posted by Beauregard
The one constant in every team you join is you. So whenever you think about what a buff/debuff set provides, don't try to imagine what you'll be doing for other people. Think about what it does for you.
Unfortunately far too many players spend all their time imagining what other people need - and their imagination doesn't match reality. People simply don't structure their build around the idea that they'll have an Empathy Defender strapped to their hip. They need enough recovery to run their defenses and attack without the benefit of Recovery Aura. They need enough recharge to run their attack cycle cycle without the benefit of Adrenalin Boost. They need enough defenses to survive their fighting style without Fortitude. And, of course, they need to take a small enough amount of damage that they can operate without Absorb Pain. Now, builds like this were impossible in the original CoH and still are at low levels. But past the DFB levels, Empathy Defenders will increasingly find their role to be as a Blaster rather than a 'healer'. And Empathy is horrible self-support for a Blaster. It has decent self-healing, a bit of extra self-recovery, and that's it. Now take that same Empathy Defender and flip them into a Pain Domination Corruptor. You've got the same self-healing benefit. But you've also got a host of +damage abilities some additional resistance and -def/-res debuffs - and it's coupled to much greater native firepower. |
does that sound bitter ? Only 7+ years of Empaths are fine as is, when I know they are not. YRMV
BIOSPARK :: DARKTHORN :: SKYGUARD :: WILDMAGE
HEATSINK :: FASTHAND :: POWERCELL :: RUNESTAFF
Healer is a team role in City of Heroes.
This screenshot is legit.
My cat is the reincarnation of Bob Fosse.
Twenty-nine Venetian blinds, Matilda won't come waltzing with me.
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Er. That's not what my early experience with CoH was like. No one I knew had a stone tank - they were all Invulnerability. And Empaths weren't "must have". Sure, they were common and got invites, but my SG? It was Radiation Emission that "must have", if anything. We used Force Fields for +defense, not Fortitude, though we certainly thought Fortitude was very nice.|
Originally Posted by plainguy
You really have to understand that when the game first came out Empath was a MUST HAVE on a team. Everything else was secondary. As a matter of fact if you where the Empath you pretty much had your choice of starting a team and everyone asking you to join your team. That is how much power they commanded back then. Empath=Automatic invite. After the Empath was a Stone Tank. Stone Tank was the only powers set that was able to cap out or close to cap on defenses. So eating a few purple inspirations kept you going. Back then the main thing a tank did was taunt. That was it, taunt. After that then a Kinetic or a Force Field player. Then after that was some sort of Blaster and a Scrapper. Then mix the rest up.
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Long before IOs, long before Incarnates, observant people figured out that stacking buffs and debuffs made you need so much less healing that "lesser" heals were sufficient. You could heal less often, or for less magnitude, and maybe both, and do fine, which meant you didn't really need an Empath, whose big perceived forté was lots of healing. You could get by instead with other sets that offered other buffs which in turn made healing less important.
Inventions and Incarnates certainly accentuated this, since they both let everyone need less healing overall or, in the case of Rebirth, let everyone potentially provide some healing.
I will say this. While Rebirth gives a nice big green number up front, and gives everyone pretty rocking regen for a short while, the fact that it tails off to lower benefit in the later half of its duration means it's not a complete substitute for things like Regen Aura, which is full-strength for its full duration. Yeah, if you bring a bunch of people to stack Rebirth, that can address the decay, but then you could have had something else, like stacked Barrier, and brought one or two Empaths (who could bring Barrier, btw), and likely end up better overall.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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Wow, it took to post 11 to say this. I expected better of this community. |
Originally Posted by Erhnam
Healers are redundant, Defenders are not
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Edit: Do I get a prize? I am post number 37 in this thread!!
Re: Empaths being "must have" in the early days of the game
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Empathy being "must have" could be a server-specific issue.|
Originally Posted by UberGuy
That's not what my early experience with CoH was like.... Empaths weren't "must have".
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Even well after the game launch, on certain servers, empaths demanded payment for the privilege of having them on your pickup team, while on other servers, people kind of shrugged at empaths and hoped they knew how to buff.
Dont get me wrong! I dont play my emp defender as a pure healer, but thats what hes slotted towards. When no ones hurt and all buffed up, I blast with my -Def slotted radiation blasts and use my Holds from the Psi APP to keep mobs away from the squishy members of the team. Im not a dedicated healer and will happily blast away when needed, just dont expect me to be able to bring anything down quickly.
Im just feeling a little less busy of late.
Rockshock (Druid Tanker), Medicat (Combat Medic), Dwarf From the North (Ice Mage), Rocket Gal (Energy Blaster), Graveborn (Undead Mastermind), Streeker (Punching Speedster), Op. Sidewinder (Recluse's pet Spider)
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Uh what? How is increased DPS a hit? Killing things too fast?
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Originally Posted by Auroxis
Empathy still has RA's for leagues, and while Fort and AB lose a bit of their shine, they're still awesome powers if used wisely.
As for incarnate slots themselves, Destiny hit all buffers pretty hard. However, damage dealers were hit just as hard by Lore, Interface, and Judgement. |
I just spam my new Healing Arrow (Blazing Arrow slotted with Defender proc and set)
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If everyone does more DPS, having DPS specialists isn't as important.
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Originally Posted by icemanstryketh
Uh what? How is increased DPS a hit? Killing things too fast?
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Mains (Freedom) @Auroxis
Auroxis - Emp/Rad/Power Defender Pylon Video Soloing an AV
Pelvic Thunder - SS/Elec/Mu Brute
Sorajin - Elec/Nin Stalker
Neuropain - Sonic/Mental/Elec Blaster
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They are still doing proportionally more damage though. I don't think it's a valid comparison. It's only really applicable, I guess, to solo/small teams, but I thought we were talking about iTrials.
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Originally Posted by Auroxis
If everyone does more DPS, having DPS specialists isn't as important.
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Hybrid-assault.
Or Hybrid-support (more heals in your heals for your heals).
-------
Hew in drag baby
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Actually, they aren't. Lore, Interface and Judgement are all fixed size contributions to damage, that don't vary by AT. What that does is perhaps best illustrated by example. Let's say Defenders have damage "rating" of 2 and Scrappers of 5. The ratio there is 2.5. If Incarnate abilities add 2 to both, then Defenders deal 4 and Scrappers deal 7, a ratio of 1.75.|
Originally Posted by icemanstryketh
They are still doing proportionally more damage though.
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It's still very likely that damage-dealing ATs deal the most actual damage (not counting damage-like effects such as -regen on hard targets), but the benefit of Lore, Interface and Judgement doesn't scale proportionally for the damage dealers.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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Lore is one power that actually performs a lot better with a defender than with a straight damage dealer(see the pylon video in my sig). Defenders have buffs/debuffs that increase lore pet damage, and the support skills to keep the lore pets alive. Same cannot be said for most damage dealers.
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Originally Posted by UberGuy
It's still very likely that damage-dealing ATs deal the most actual damage (not counting damage-like effects such as -regen on hard targets), but the benefit of Lore, Interface and Judgement doesn't scale proportionally for the damage dealers.
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Mains (Freedom) @Auroxis
Auroxis - Emp/Rad/Power Defender Pylon Video Soloing an AV
Pelvic Thunder - SS/Elec/Mu Brute
Sorajin - Elec/Nin Stalker
Neuropain - Sonic/Mental/Elec Blaster
Agreed. But even in examples where that's not the case (FF, for example), the change between a "support" AT and a damage dealing one wouldn't be proportional. (Not that I believe you think otherwise.) To your point, though, if you can significantly buff the pets' DPS or debuff the targets' DR and/or regen, the support character can take a staggering lead.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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Defenders (and others with support powers) are the kind of characters that bring what you might consider "force multipliers" to any setting that others don't have.|
Originally Posted by icemanstryketh
Uh what? How is increased DPS a hit? Killing things too fast?
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This "force multiplier" is brought to bear when that Defender uses their buffs, heals, etc to increase the efficiency of everyone else on the team.
As a result, everyone on the team is doing higher DPS than they could otherwise achieve on their own. You can have the highest DPS Scrapper or Blaster on the team. But, they can never achieve the level of performance that buffs, debuffs, etc from others can. IE, a Blaster with Fortitude, Adrenalin Boost, or any other kind of similar buff is much more effective than one without.
I believe that the Incarnate powers are probably being created with that concept in mind. Yes, Destiny and Interface are great on their own. But, when you have a full league/team of them, the force multipliers add a lot. And, I am of the opinion that while incarnate powers are great, they can never truly replace legitimate buffs, etc that a player can normally bring. Why do you think people still want Defenders, Controllers, Corruptors, and Masterminds for teams? In short, because they bring support abilities that can never really be replaced.
@ Dr Gemini
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| �If we would come together and be great role models, it would be amazing to see how the next generation turns out.� |
I think some people overlook the mindset of the player. For when I play my emp defender, I keep a close eye on the rest of the team. Not only where their green bar is at, but where they are and how many enemies are near. In other words, I'm proactive instead of just spamming heals.
As for my toons using Destiny... if I get you, great. If I miss your toon with my buffs, not going to worry about it as I go back to blasting and smashing.
So while in certain teams made up of the same players who played with each other for some time, Incarnate could certainly replace someone playing a emp.
But in PUGs, no...not without lots of teamwipes.
/Empaths can turn three people into Jesus, one person into God, and everyone else into the twelve apostles.~Angry_Citizen
Don't you know that discussion of power selection/slotting can ONLY be based on hearsay, rumor, idle speculation, and bald-faced lies??!? ~Elf_Sniper
I'm convinced that the vast majority of wrongthinking people are right.
http://www.montypython.net/scripts/right-think.php
perma jump is ---> /up 1
lol@healers
Give me someone that plays a good empath any day and knows it's not just rocking the aura and rezzing.
Wanted: Origin centric story arcs.
If you've only played an AT once (one set combo) and "hate" it - don't give up. Roll a different combo. It may just be those sets not clicking for you.