Which power sets need the most help?

Thanks Tex, I think that you're awesome and I don't like arguing with anyone actually BUT again I said nothing about pushing values up and up :P.

Ok, this is what I am trying to say. These three sets need improvement to make them up to par to the other control sets...

Mind
Ice
Gravity

I would like to see these sets shine so they can reach the epic levels of Dark, Earth, Illusion and Plant control's effectiveness be it an increase of damage or an increase of mitigation. Leave the rest of the sets alone. I'm not asking for a global control buff I'm asking for the control sets that lag behind be brought to the front and adjusted to be able to compete with the other big sets. These sets need to be fixed because they are broken and their control or damage is lacking.

Even if you Balance Plant Control it will still be near the top especially in the late game unless you completely butcher the recharge and damage on Carrion Creepers (as well the other broken interface issues with CC), Reduce the recharge of SOC as well as lower the mag, and fix roots entirely. The set is sooo well balanced so then after the adjustments happen it will still be excellent at control.

I know that me and you were discussing this in beta and I think Ketch was in the fray as well but I still don't see an over abundance of Plant doms or trollers running around let alone anyone who knows how to slot it properly. This is only from my experience since I do not do SG's and thee fact that I only play on Freedom and Virtue...who knows.

It took me quite a while to figure out how Electric Control works...it's very original I think...it really makes change your way of thinking (layered soft control instead of hard control).

Heck, I'm still unsure about Dark...sometimes I think that it can exceed or come close to fire or plant in damage. I've been told that you can have 4 Haunts out at the same time and with enough Recharge Shadow Field can become great at control and dmg tool much like Volcanic Gasses. Also Living Shadows can take 3 damage procs whereas Roots can only take 2...not that the procs difference would directly affect damage output.

Julius:

Empathy and Sonic Resonance are no better at self mitigation. I understand however that Poison requires more risk than those sets to do its job.

The sad part of this is that there are a lot of sets that seem to be underperforming... but all the need is tweaking to bring them up to par.

Like Battle Axe - all it really needs is the target cap on its AoEs increased to match War Mace.

Energy Melee? Reduce the animation time of ET some, and increase the chance to stun across the board... but most especially in Whirling Hands. (Personal opinion, but more reliable mitigation can make up for the lack of AoE damage.)

Electrical Blast? First, Increase the damage in Short Circuit to at least match that of other cones... preferably a bit higher, but with the large -End and the -Recovery, I can accept that I might be asking too much there. Then, give Tesla Cage Tier 2 levels of damage, to allow it to act as the needed 3rd single-target ranged attack. I think that's all Electrical Blast needs to work.

Force Fields? Give Force Bolt tier 1 or 2 damage, and incorporate a chance to stun in every power that involves knockback or knockdown.

Unfortunately, there's also plenty of sets that need more than just 'tweaks.' Devises, Ice Control, Psychic Blast on Blasters, Spines, Mercenaries... these are the ones that stand out to me. And they need a larger discussion regarding how I would fix them (for the ones that I even have an idea how to...) then I want to go into here.

I'll add to my list where as earlier I only posted about Devices.

I still place devices as #1.
2. Probably force field. Multiple ATs use it. It pays for its specialty in that it's too specialized. While other sets can end up offering near to or just as much protection while also having other useful tools. Maybe the new absorb tech will find it's way into this set just to give it something.

Years ago I posted how I thought it would be interesting of Forcefield bubbles had hitpoints of their own so while they provide defense, if they were hit, their hp would reduce (maybe the amount of defense offered would reduce too now that I think about it).

I'm unsure of how that'd work with multiple force fields perhaps they don't stack, have diminishing returns, fully stack up to a cap, or simply add to the timer one the first bubble runs out of hp or its timer is up, the second kicks in.

3. Poison still needs another pass. Everything about what doesn't work well has already been mentioned.

4. Sonic Resonance. It's another two trick pony with resists buffs and debuffs and a decent final power which has been covered by other sets just as well or even better for the most part except for Force Field. And where as FF can get people to the defense soft cap with maneuvers, Sonic has no power pool to pair up with it. For that reason alone it should offer more utility than - resist one of which requires an ally to be useful. Not to mention that ally better be a melee combatant, because unless they're IOd out, any one else soley relying on the sonic user to keep them up will end up going down just a little slower than before.

5. Energy Melee: already covered in this thread.

6. Mercs haven't played them, but it's mentioned so often that it probably belongs here

7. TA: already mention in this thread.

8. DP: needs some animation times reduced in several powers and a revisit on the effects of Swap Ammo.

9. Electric Blast: hampered by not having a reliable form of a teir 3 single target attack. Instead it has a hold, and a temp-pet which causes unnessary aggro for the user. Electric Blast's version of Tesla Cage should be turned into a new power Tesla Bolt: a short ranged, very high damage st attack that has a hold component to it. Make it the Electric Blast version of KO Blow.

Up the other attack's end drain to pair up better with Short Circuit. Add End Drain to Tesla Bolt. And give Voltaic Sentinal a resistance shield that protects the caster from some of that unnessary aggro.

10. Broad Sword: it's suppossed to provide burst damage vs. Katana's consistant dps, but because of Katana's speed, BS always falls behind and never ends up providing the burst necessary to even out.

11. Battle Axe: I would swear that the momentum mechanic was destine for this set but was then used to create the awesomeness that is Titan Weapons. It needs something besides concept of using the axe weapon set to really give it more appeal.

It's surprising to me that Empathy isn't listed more in this thread. I feel like it gets bashed regularly on these boards, especially at higher levels.

It's a bit of a volatile thing of me to say, but IMO Force Field suffers from a cousin of the "healzor" mentality itself in regards to players who believe lots of knockback powers (as compared to lots of heals) are a keystone to great gameplay.

That's not to say everyone who likes Force Field falls into this category, but from my experience the ideal way to use FF is to grab 5 powers tops (if not fewer) and grab everything else from your other set or pools because what's there is so much better. What really makes me sad about FF is looking at Tactics and thinking "This is better than half of what's available in my primary set."

Force Field with DDR might be something to see. And here's hoping it picks up some Absorb mechanics. Based on some leaked info, it appears it will soon be possible to cast a power at a ally OR an enemy, and Sonic and FF's intangible powers would IMO be very interesting with an Absorb mechanic when cast at a teammate.

What's really tell-tale about the state of FF though, is he fact that everyone considers it mostly a buff set. It isn't mostly a buff set by design: it has more enemy-affecting powers than Cold. But these powers suck so much that no one takes them seriously. They make up the fodder for what support sets contritbute to APPs and Veteran powers or else are just ignored completely.

This idea is a little "off-topic", so I apologize, and perhaps something that has previously been brought up by the players, but here goes;

Something that would be nice for the Devs to consider regarding the "parity" issues between sets and under-performers in particular would be adding a 10th power to every primary and secondary powerset. You may be thinking that I mean adding a tier 10 power, but in reality, I am saying to ADD ONE NEW POWER anywhere in the tiers, thus creating 10 tiers.

This would add two powers to each potential build so we could address that with two more power picks like so: 1,1,2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16,18,20,22,24,26,28,30,32,34 ,36,38,40,42,44,47,49
Then we would need to add back in the 6 slots we just lost, so gain 3 slots starting at level 19. This would allow for the two extra powers while keeping the same number of enhancement slots, but with the added bonus of making the 20-30 range feel less "slot-hungry" and the 33-50 range feel less "slot-heavy".

The reason why I feel this approach can solve many powerset issues is two-fold;

A) This allows the devs to add a new power to every Powerset that does not have to contend with the "cottage rule". Underperforming sets get a more powerful "new" power, while more balanced/powerful sets would get a power that could me more situational or designed to fill-in gaps in the sets which are "well-known" (Electric Blast not having a powerful third blast, for instance).

B) It gives the devs a very reasonable excuse for re-arranging powers that perhaps need to be opened sooner or later in builds. Everyone knows that each powerset has a common perspective for whether it is "late" blooming or "early", so powers could be swapped around with some small amount of "impunity" since everyone is going to get NEW TOYS.

Just something on my wish list.

Storm Summoning. It's one of the original power sets, and it hasn't been touched. I recognize that stormies are an elite bunch (and I might point out that it seems like none of the Devs have toons with this set, and no signature NPCs are stormies), but I wonder if a little TLC might revitalize this unique and fun buff/debuff/soft control set.

Gale, for starters, must be taken when SS is a secondary set (controllers, corruptors, masterminds), and is a very unreliable, situationally utile power. It seems to miss most targets and causes negligible damage. Knockback is ample in the SS set, and obviously gale is all about KB. First, it should at least be accurate. It's the kind of power that one falls back on when in a tight spot, and it's likely to not even do the one thing it's useful for. It has a slow recharge rate, and is endurance costly. I would also suggest adding an "impact" mechanic such as was recently introduced for gravity control, so that targets who end up flying through the air end up potentially receiving additional damage.

O2 Boost is pretty good.

Snow Storm is extremely endurance intensive. It slows and has a recharge debuff, but could be improved with a to-hit debuff (it IS a snow storm after all!). It's interesting to watch AVs run frantically when this power is on them-- they don't seem to realize it's not hurting them all that much.

Steamy Mist is also a good power, though the defense it offers is marginal, considering this is a defender primary power set.

Freezing Rain is one of the best, most underrated debuffs in the game. Wouldn't change a thing.

Hurricane. Well, again, extremely hard on the endurance. The range of the to hit debuff is far too short. In my opinion, any ranged attacks should have the greatest debuff. Melee attacks should have an easier time getting through the debuff effect, which is where the knockback component would help protect the player.

Thunder Clap, for a tier 7 power, should not provide a mere mag 2 stun. It looks cool, but gets a pass more often than not. At least a chance for a mag 3 stun, perhaps with the added component of a blinding effect or a significant endurance drain on successful hits would make this power so much more useful.

Tornado is one of my favourite powers, but it has issues. First, it works against itself by flinging its targets arounds the map. It would be nice if it could once in awhile trap a target within its vortex and do some consistent damage. This power is great on AVs, because they can't be knocked back by it. It locks on, and spins away while the damage ticks off. The defense debuff and stun effects are ok. Because of the unusual way this "pet" interacts with targets (i.e. erratically), it would be more effective if its stats (damage and debuffs) were boosted. Visually, it seems that an improvement has been made on this concept with Water Spout and Scirocco's sand storms, so Tornado should receive this treatment for sure.

Lightning Storm is (well, should be) the defining power in this set. It does far less damage than it should, with an extremely lengthy recharge period. Either the damage should go up, or the endurance cost and recharge decreased so that larger, stacked, storm effects become possible. The storm itself is rooted when it should at the very least follow slowly behind the caster (heck, even blasters' auto turret pet was emancipated from its initially stationary nature!). No reason why these storms shouldn't be mobile. The knockback is especially problematic for this power, as targets are struck and knocked beyond the storm's range to hit them. This power would benefit from knock down instead of kb.

I love Storm Summoning, and currently play 4 of them on a regular basis. My primary toon, Ebon Witch, is a stormie. With some overdue attention to this set, I have no doubt that it would attract more players and reclaim its rightful place among the other signature CoH power sets.

Here is my list

Blaster: Psi Blast
Defender: (tie) Force Field and Trick Arrow.
Corruptor: (tie) Traps - Time Bomb and Trick Arrow
Control: (tie) Gravity (yes, it got buffed to no longer be the clear loser but it only runs neck and neck with ice) and Ice Control
Mastermind: (tie) Mercenaries and Ninjas
Melee: Energy Melee
Kheldians: Peacebringer