Issue 2X: old powersets revamp?

I love a memory of watching a single Thugs/TA Mastermind hold off an entire 10 man SG in their own base while the rest of us res'd and ran back through the raid-porter. They're both fine IMHO.

I loathe Electric Blast. Simply cannot stand it. Too little pew pew for too much soft control. Still that's my opinion and I know a guy that loves his Elec/Elec blaster more than anything.

Yeah, I have to say this is pretty GD annoying that there are some that won't except that every AT or powerset may just not be for everyone. If they want KD then there are a ton of powersets that have KD go get one of those and leave KB powersets alone.

People that play energy blasters and PB's know how to deal with KB, use it to their and their teams advantage and don't want it changed period.

Something else I want to clear up because I missed this post somehow:

I'm not claiming you're spouting nonsense. Far from it. I just find your claim to be one-sided, valuing "variety" above all else, and at the same time ignoring that variety is really only useful when it works. When a powerset or an AT is considered, it needs to perform in a way that's comparable to most others in its category, and it needs to be able to perform without requiring an abnormally large investment. In other words, you can't make a powerset or an AT that's intentionally.

Yes, I'm sure there are plenty of people who might like a weak powerset, but they will like it DESPITE its weakness, not because of it. "Hard mode" powersets are not a good idea, for the simple fact that City of Heroes did what no other MMO has done, and put my difficulty in my own hands. If I want "hard mode," I can achieve it. I don't need my character to be weak. I can make my character weaker, I can make my enemies stronger, and all of this IF I choose to make my game harder.

You can't ignore technical problems with powersets just because you like their style. Almost without a shadow of a doubt, those technical problems can be fixed without ruining what you like about the powerset. Niche appeal is no excuse for sub-par performance.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I'm sure that works wonders in caves and buildings with a low ceiling. And are you saying that every Energy Blast Blaster should take Hover?

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

My Ice/Dev blaster Cryomino is optimized for Trip Mines, because she was my soloing character for a long while. She has maxed recharge, with a rare Alpha that affects recharge, and Hasten and lots of +recharge IO bonuses. She even has a chance for fire damage proc in Trip Mine, if I recall. She can put down 14 Trip Mines solo before they start to explode. My max is 28, when assisted with teammate speed boosts. I consider myself an expert in Trip Mine use.

I generally lay down 8-10 Trip Mines, then lead off with Surveillance and then Freezing Rain, both of which debuff resistance. That's enough to kill most EBs. Sometimes they need a single finishing shot. I haven't fought Terra in forever, but this is the strategy I used to take out the Keres in the new DA arcs. The Sentinel, if I recall correctly, took a few finishing shots after he hit the mine field but he still went down in about three seconds.

That's not counting the two minute lead time in setting up the mines, of course.

You can use Trip Mines on regular spawns, but it's like killing cockroaches with claymores. I agree with you that Trip Mine is worthless on a team. I do use it sometimes, but often the team pulls the enemies somewhere else and the mines never go off.

No. A good Trip Miner needs invisibility...which isn't hard to get, considering Devices also has Cloaking Device.

Generally you want to use Caltrops as a barrier between you and the enemy, so you put it on your side of the mine field. I haven't had much luck using Caltrops to bunch up enemies either, but part of that might be the Ragnarok knockdown proc I've slotted in them.

Device blasters are slow. But extraordinarily safe for a blaster. It's not a playstyle many people enjoy, but I'm glad it's there.

Devices does need some love. Smoke grenade isn't worth taking. A chance to confuse would let that power shine. Time Bomb is useful solo but not very much. (My favorite opening is Time Bomb, count to 9, LRM Rocket. Then they hit simultaneously.) They should change Time Bomb to a trigger bomb; hit it once to lay the bomb down, hit it a second time to make it explode. They've proven that they can do that now, with the new Stalker Assasination Strike behavior.

But other than those problems I love the Devices powerset. It's different and it is the best there is at what it does.

Or you could just accept that some set combinations are REALLY low maintenance. If you're looking to play a more active mastermind, by all means, look at a different power combination. If you want to be able to AFK for 30 minutes and come back to find all your bots still alive and that huge spawn really most sincerely dead? Go Bots/FF.

Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.

But some players love the knockback in Energy Blast. I depend on it with one of my defenders.

What they need to do is make a new IO set in the Knockback category named 'Suppression'. (Or 'Swan's Suppression' if you want flavor.) It should be a set with heavy +damage and +accuracy, with one proc IO that restricts the KB magnitude to 0.67 in the power you slot it in. Everyone who wants to convert KB to KD will buy and slot that proc. Problem solved.

I think a lot of the 'problems' in these powersets can be solved by new IOs. For example, Electrical Melee has several powers with a small chance for sleep, so it can be slotted with Sleep IOs...and there's a Sleep IO proc with a chance to heal self. That makes the entire powerset better. My Elec/Energy stalker has slotted all her attacks with a chance to heal; it makes her unique and much more effective.

Similarly, Electrical Blast powers could be slotted with the chance for stun proc in one of the End Mod IO sets. If we want to make the set better, give us more cool proc effects in the End Mod category. A chance for hold (which would stack with the ranged damage chance for hold proc), a chance for confusion ('who tazed me, bro!?'), or a chance for damage would allow more customization for the Electrical Blast character.

You want to make the powerset really cool? I always thought that robots should shut down once their endurance goes to zero. Have some enemies who can be defeated by sapping instead of damage, and Electrical Blast will be the hot new flavor in the game, without changing the powerset itself one bit.

While the devs don't feel KB is a problem, this has to be the single best solution suggested that I have seen for those bellyaching about KB powers in a KB powerset. Yes slot it and STFU TYVM.

I don't think IOs are the answer to say Electric Melee's (and Blasts) kinda lack luster end drain. And I think the sleep is more for flavor than anything else.

That said here you go!

Swan's Suppression
*Dial back the knockback for some added range*

ACC/DMG/RNG

ACC/END/RCH

DMG/RNG

ACC/DMG/END/RNG

DMG/END/RCH/RNG

PROC: Removes all KB/KD/KU abilities from Power

Set 2: +10% Regeneration
Set 3: +2.5% Recovery
Set 4: +1.5% Hit Points
Set 5: +7.5% +RCH
Set 6: +2.5% Defense All

I just think our exchange started off on the wrong foot.
A few quick points (I think you do fully get some of these, but they are just some things that were on my mind about what I'd said):

• My initial post was not intended to be a wet blanket on the idea of fixing things.
• And it wasn't something I thought was overly complex and doesn't really require a great amount of thought or anything (partly why it struck me as annoying to be accused of making things overly complicated).
• It's also not something I was using to validate or defend or protect any personal preferences or save things under the cottage rule or anything. It was honestly just a simple observation on how people have different subjective views for what the "objective" standard of measurement is regarding gameplay performance.
• I also replied after a very long and intense day of writing and recording in a studio and I'm not sure that I did the best job wording things!
• I don't know why I said that Trip Mines shouldn't be touched, hehe. It may or may not deserve some improvements. I honestly don't have any strong cause to not improve it, so I really don't know why I stated that (It's really inconsequential, but I remembered typing it later on and wondered why, haha).

My first post was just something I've seen and thought before and finally felt the urge and the clarity to express (fully understanding it'd likely be ignored and possibly misconstrued). If anything, I did think a person such as yourself would appreciate it. I can also see why you'd be at odds with it a bit.


Directly to what you've said above...
I absolutely have zero desire to ignore game mechanics and playability for the sake of diversity. I can understand why you would think I was coming from that angle. I intentionally left my post without much personal desire in there, because I didn't want to cloud what I was talking about. I am pretty sure that you and I agree on more of this quandary, that we've explored mostly in the theoretical, than this exchange has demonstrated.
I truly despise game experiences that have clear, uninspiring gaps in capability of achievements between presented options (ATs and powersets in this case). It's no fun when your choices keep you extremely held back, while other choices reap in the rewards.
Where we might disagree in this instance is the degree of separation within City Of Heroes. It seems to be so well balanced in being able and capable with any and everything, that the lowest outliers do not feel like a major hindrance to me. In addition to that, the earnings and the desirables do not feel out of reach and are relatively easy to attain (they have several options to acquire what you might want and you really don't need any of the highest end things to be successful). These factors are clearly different within CoH when compared to other games. This game really does a great job of allowing "everyone to win", while still maintaining enough elements to fine-tune, min-max and push yourself, should you want to.


There has been a bit of a creeping towards a different way of playing over the years that I have been here. It's pretty rampant now, actually. Things continue to be focused on faster pacing, full teaming, AoE, wipe and move. And that can (and mostly has) become the standard by which people wish to measure things.

I know that you are not the average, mainstream player, so don't think that I've been lumping you into that category.

When I've been saying that you're basing things off of your personal preferences, you think that I am overly valuing diversity... because you believe that you have found the objective standard for balance measurement.
In truth, only the designers can decide what that is. I'm not saying it is wrong for anyone else to come up with their own. I'm saying that we can come up with it all we want... we can express it... we can apparently dismiss other people's standards (as we see all the time), regardless of their enjoyment of specific options, but whatever we come up with, it is not necessarily true.

What most individuals deem as the objective standard of measurement is, at least partially, based off what they believe the standard playstyle approach should be and/or their own personal preferences.

You'll get people from all extremes touting that this should be changed or that this shouldn't be changed. You'll get that from every far extent of things.
I absolutely didn't come in here to battle over what I felt didn't need changing.
I honestly just wanted to offer the viewpoint that many people should look at these types of things with a more open mind. That was the extent of my reason for posting what I did.
I am quite certain that the developers and designers do this. So, I have little fears about such things. I just tire of seeing the claims that clash against other people's claims... when, so very much of it stems from personal preference and what they deem to be the appropriate standard for measuring game balances.

Again... what do I mean by that? What is too slow, quick enough, too quick?
Does "too quick" even exist any more? It just seems like the "quickest it can be" is the standard. If things were to continue on that route, there would be a great number of variances completely lost to us all. It's already lost to those who follow that path of playstyle... but if we balance all around that standard, it is lost to us all.
While that's not something I'd, personally, like to see... it's also not something I believe will happen. And, so, I just figured I'd mention that people should open their minds to a greater degree of disparity for a game that really doesn't punish you for any choices you can make.

We could, indeed, argue about this in circular fashion... but I think we agree... we may just have a different middle point for our degree of balance and fun. Or we may just both like to spout on about such things in our spare time.

I hope this made some sense and offers something worthy of the time it took to read, hehe.

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Making Mastermind primary attacks worthwhile would be lovely. Hell, give them the ranged mod from Doms (.95) and then give them the melee mod from Khelds (.85)

Sam, you can consider us friends so I feel I'm not being rude when I tell you this but...

Stop. Lying.

Thank you.

Everything I've tried to do so far is exclude "playstyle" from the equation entirely, and instead focus on the results. It may seem one-sided for me to say this, but ultimately, what matters in an MMO from a mechanical standpoint is the results your chosen playstyle generates, and these results are actually very directly measurable. Levelling speed, number of drops per unit of time, frequency of defeats per instance and so forth. I get that the game is supposed to be fun subjectively, but whatever way we pick to make it fun must still conform to some overall standard level of results objectively.

Where I feel we keep talking past each other is I'm really, honestly not trying to discuss playstyles and preference. I feel all playstyles (within reason) should be catered to and allowed access to roughly the same results with roughly the same level of investment. That's exactly what choice is born out of - when you can pick a playstyle based solely on what you like and how you prefer to do things AND NOT on what works and what doesn't, that's when you have a meaningful choice.

I get that Trip Mines, for instance, just aren't for me. I don't have the patience to have my preparations wasted if I sneeze at the wrong time. If I could be convinced that Trip Mine minefileds were equal or better performers than just blasting stuff - a practice which takes considerably less effort - then I wouldn't have a problem with them. From my own experience, however, they don't measure up, at least not on Common or SO builds. I want to see that approach, and others, give people access to the same results, that's all.

I don't think it's subjective to say that most playing most sets should produce similar levels of progression. That's the driving mechanic behind the combat system in its entirety - you kill stuff and you get stuff for it. That's the only thing which is constant between all powersets and the one thing that should be balanced around regardless of a set's actual implementation.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

In order for you to accuse me of lying, you need to assume I believe one thing but claim something else. If you really DO believe this, then that is actually quite rude. I'm hoping you don't actually think I'm intentionally saying something that I know is false, because I'm not.

What I say is exactly what I've seen. What I say is exactly what I've experienced. I've been playing Stalkers since the old round of changes, and I've been teaming with those Stalkers since the last round of changes. Every time I did, I was either looked upon as a gimped Scrapper who wasn't contributing anything, or otherwise simply not invited. I actually got into an argument with the Satanic Hamster on exactly what my Stalker was contributing to the team I was on.

Your experience may vary. That's fine. Disagree with me, contradict me, interject your own anecdote. But to accuse me of lying is tantamount to insulting me to my face, and "no offence" really doesn't cut it. I have never said a lie in my entire time on this forum, counting as far back as eight years. I've been wrong plenty of times, yes, but never intentionally.

From here on out, I'm going to ask you to either present evidence that I'm lying or to otherwise refrain from making these accusations. If you don't like what I'm saying, then please find a less insulting way of saying it.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Then don't speak of things you're ignorant of.

Do you not see what you're doing? You're essentially telling me my experience with Stalkers never happened. Either I'm lying or I don't know what happened to me. Neither of those is true.

What I said happened. Maybe not to you, but it happened to me.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Because it doesn't take Arcana to calculate a Stalker was contributing plenty fine on a team. Period.

All that other mess about being a black sheep or getting a pity spot? Malarky. Maybe true before the 1st round of adds to the AT. But you're only trying to paint Stalker's situation in a way to justify overpowering them. You don't have to do that. They got their buff, no point in back pedaling and trying to prove Stalkers weren't worth sh*t so people will think Stalkers deserved what they got more.

Hell, the whole crusade before the buff was to get *rid* of the stigma that Stalkers were bad, a stigma they lived with since their inception. Stalkers do not deserve that stigma after they got demoralize, a base crit chance, a scaling crit chance and more HP. Yes, the stigma was there but it was *NOT* deserved at that point.

Part of it was from all the "can't attack till I'm hidden" stalkers that didn't keep up with steam rolling teams. Just because stalkers could contribute meaningfully doesn't mean they were. I myself have kicked stalkers off the team for repeatedly running out of combat so they could regain hidden status.

Not entirely deserved, I'll grant you that much, but it was still not entirely undeserved, either. Every member on the team with an awake player at the keyboard is at least contributing SOMETHING, but my point is that what a Stalker was contributing was visibly less than even a comparative Scrapper could pull off. At least, that's what I got from experience. I played a lot of Stalkers, I played a lot of Scrappers, I played a lot of Brutes. I'm not counting Masterminds since those are their own can of worms.

However, between Brutes, Stalkers and Scrappers, Stalkers always left me feeling I tried the hardest and achieved the least, especially on a team. I can't tell you how many times I had my Assassin's Strike ruined because someone caught aggro and I got an autohit Hurricane to the face, or someone attacked and wonky aggro mechanics made a minion shoot me before I did anything.

Before the changes, I could NEVER get a Stalker scrapping out of hide to reach anywhere near the performance of a Scrapper, on a team or solo. I could sort of make that up between Assassin's Strike and Placate, but at best this could just about get me to break even with my Scrappers, and at worst - if the game hated me - I just trailed far behind. It was getting to the point where I was physically incapable of making more Stalkers because I felt I was humiliating my characters by creating them in that AT.

Those are my experiences and you CANNOT argue with them. You can argue whether they're representative, that's fine. I know I don't speak for everybody. But what you cannot argue is that they didn't happen, because they did. If you want to call me a liar about it, then go ahead, but I assure that that'll be the last time I take it on the chin. This happened to me. That's my experience.

After the I22 changes, though? I've been having the time of my life. At no point has it ever felt like my Stalker is under-performing, at no point has it felt like I'm wasting my time, at no point has it felt like I could do twice as well for half the effort with another AT. I call that a success. Granted, it's a success at the cost of changing the AT significantly, but what's done is done.

I don't feel the need to exaggerate to justify the change. If you remember my long argument for why I no longer play Blasters and why I deleted all of my level 50 Blasters and remade them as other ATs, I was just on the verge of having one of those for Stalkers. I was THIS close to simply going through my list, deleting all my Stalkers and rerolling them as Scrappers and Brutes. Then I started hearing news of Stalker improvements, I held off on that decision, and I'm glad I did, because the performance problems which had originally made me consider deleting all my Stalkers are gone now. Whether you choose to believe it or not, that's what happened.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I don't see how it'd be visible. You don't min/max (to a glaring degree at times ). That's the situation where a Scrapper and Brute pull ahead. Scrappers aren't any more survivable than Stalkers with just base SO stats. It's only when you start pumping out lots of +rech to heightened DPS and start pumping in lots of bonuses to boost survival did Scrappers start to pull ahead.

Everything else is based on feel. You can't see feelings.

It IS based on feel. Everything I've said so far is based almost entirely on feel and almost not at all on actual numbers. Sadly, "feel" is how I operate in most things and that's what I remember. Sometimes my feelings can be tainted, but over the years, I've learned to trust them because they show me things I can't always put into words.

For instance, if you'll allow me a slight aside, the way I decide which attacks to use when is based on "want." In certain situations, there are certain attacks I've grown to "want" to use because my mind has concluded they're potent based on direct experience. That's how I learn. Take, for instance, Sweeping Strike. It's the start of Stalker DB Weaken combo, it's a very powerful cone attack and it's really fast. This makes it a good attack in my mind, and almost every time I don't know what to use, that's what my brain "wants" me to use.

The thing is, though, that the more I played pre-I22 Stalkers, the less I "wanted" to play them and the less I "wanted" to make more of them. The more I teamed with them, the less I actually "wanted" to team because it simply highlighted how much better everyone else was performing. This is something I've never felt while playing any other AT, with the exception of Blasters, and Blasters I stopped playing for exactly this reason.

Ever since I22 launched, I haven't felt that. I teamed with Kim, both with you and on TFs and with other people, I played her alone and sent her through a variety of pretty nasty missions, and that old feeling of being underwhelmed with my character is just GONE. Nowhere to be found.

A lot of this has to do with the fact that I don't depend on Hide so much. If I can pull off a hidden Assassin's Strike, I will. If I can't, I have other tools, as well. This makes me feel a LOT better on a rushing team that won't let me re-hide, it makes me feel a lot better when fighting the Rikti and it make me feel slightly less bad when a Hidden Assassin's Strike misses.

Yes, it's based on "feel," but Stalkers used to feel very bad, and now they feel very good.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

But this isn't about Stalkers before and Stalkers after. This is about just Stalkers before. Of course you're going to feel a lot better about Stalkers now, because they do more damage than Scrappers.

That's extremely academic to prove. Now prove that Stalkers were tantamount to a waste of space before. Prove that a badly played Scrapper is better than a badly played Stalker.

I suppose it's just easier to kick the Stalker that runs and hides vs the Scrapper that constantly faceplants.