The worst powersets in the game?
By
Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2012-06-29 21:03 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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Picking apart the pick-apart;|
Originally Posted by Ein_Dose
Okay this isn't the point of the thread, but I'm gonna just quickly use my Peacebringer experience to shoot you down.
-Since one heal is an ally heal and one is a self heal, it's more like one heal either way. Neither of them are good. -You can't make an attack chain out of two 'great' melees. Trust me, I tried. -You need more than a single res toggle to have any sort of staying power. -Blasts actually aren't very good. They do chain, though. -I tried them, the AoEs aren't very good either. -Inherent flight's not that much of a bonus these days, since every build can spare a slot for a travel power and even the ones that don't can get Ninja Run. -Photon Seekers are pretty good, but that's one good, unique power in twenty-seven. -Actually there's two, and I can tell you aren't even very good as a Peacebringer because you didn't take it into account, Light Form is pretty great nowadays but doesn't really make up for the rest. |
-Essence Boost (Dull Pain clone) and Reform Essence (Self Heal). That's two solid heals and a +HP power. The ally heal is just a bonus.
-Dwarf form has melee too. You can chain the Dwarf and human attacks easily now that transformation is instant.
-Dwarf form disagrees. Coupled with Essence Boost? Really disagrees.
-Nova form. Human form ranged attacks are just gap fillers.
-AoEs, see above. Nova AoE is fast and powerful.
-Inherent still saves power picks and don't need slotting. Which, admittedly, is good given the tightness of Kheld builds.
-Light Form should, admittedly, go without saying now.
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| I steered clear of suggesting Peacebringers in my opening post, because technically speaking they aren't a powerset, but Peacebringers are pretty rubbish. You also didn't mention the tons of often hard to control knockback. Depending on your build they can play like a poorly built Blaster or an even worse Scrapper, and the only real way to salvage it is to turn into a Blaster with very few blasts and Overload. |
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| Warshades are pretty good though if you get the build and timing right. |
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.
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Ice and Stone armours say hi |
Originally Posted by Organica
Ice Melee.
Since it's so meh that people haven't even remembered to mention it. |
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.
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I knew once the hate really got going the defense posts would start. Let's see where this goes from here.
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
so basically if you read between the lines.. everything pretty much blow.. lol
The hard things I can do--- The impossible just take a little bit longer.
If numbers are so much more important than a teammate who is fun to play with, forget about the game altogether and go play with a calculator instead. -Claws and Effect-
Based on subjective hate you would win that bet my friend.
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
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Eh, I just personally don't agree with the call-outs made on Kheldians, especially with the recent buffs (lord knows they were needed, mind), especially when some I0 powersets are still languishing where they got left...like Stone armour with it's 'all defences, except one Res armour and a completely out of place tier 9' or Ice armour.|
Originally Posted by Darth_Khasei
I knew once the hate really got going the defense posts would start. Let's see where this goes from here.
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I mean, when was the last time you saw a Stone or Ice tank? They used to be relatively common, until a slew of powersets that were 1)Up to date with mechanics and activation/end costs etc and, 2) simply bloomin' better.
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.
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I play on Freedom and pretty much see everything mate. A BAF the other day had three, but I get your drift.
It kind of reminds me of living in Los Angeles where 224 languages are spoken and we have people from ever corner of the globe which I LOVE!!!!!
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
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Saw a Stone Tanker running about yesterday and Ice the day before that. I'd have seen the Ice again yesterday, but I was letting the 20 hour cooldown expire so I could claim another piece of Overwhelming Force.
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Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
I mean, when was the last time you saw a Stone or Ice tank? They used to be relatively common, until a slew of powersets that were 1)Up to date with mechanics and activation/end costs etc and, 2) simply bloomin' better.
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Out of the sets I've played:
1. Ranged Damage - Ice. Has decent single target damage, but AE leaves something to be desired. And out of all the crappy snipe powers, this one is the worst - a long range hold with minimal damage - wow!
Plays more like a controller set than ranged damage, since everything is
centered around "slow".
2. Scrapper Primary - dual blades. Dual Blades has mediocre damage, and I've never been a fan of the combo system in this game.
3. Brute Primary - TW. TW is just too frigging slow, by the time you've wound up your attack, your target is usually dead from someone else. PLus with the slow speed, hard to get rage up.
4. Scrapper Secondary - Fire or Regen. Both have low survivability.
131430 Starfare: First Contact
178774 Tales of Croatoa: A Rose By Any Other Name ( 2009 MA Best In-Canon Arc ) ( 2009 Player Awards - Best Serious Arc )
I'd have to disagree with the hate Beast Mastery is getting. Beast/Dark is ripping the bad guys to shreds. Granted, it's a little slow early on, but even just the second Lioness helps. The Dire Wolf turns things around completely. Part of the problem, I think, is you have to play it a bit differently from other MMs: You have to actually use those attack powers. Once those Pack Mentality buffs get stacking, those beasties are death on four legs. The other thing that helps is target-attacking with them rather than letting them stay in defensive for bodyguard.
So, yeah, in short, Beast Mastery is great if you play it more actively than most people are used to having to play MMs. I wouldn't say it's in the top ranks for MM primaries, but certainly above Mercs. And Ninjas.
Virtue Server
Avatar art by Daggerpoint
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Originally Posted by Darth_Khasei
I play on Freedom and pretty much see everything mate.
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I thought Virtue was where you could pretty much see everything mate.
Poison gets my vote for one of the worst powersets. One AoE slow with a small chance for hold, one AoE -end power with an almost non-existent chance for hold, and two single target debuffs. Alright, technically the debuffs have a splash effect, but the radius is so small that you can't count on hitting anything but your primary target. And they have a hit check so you don't always hit your primary target either.
If you can stick it out until level 39*, the tier 9 is great. However, it's PBAoE, so you may not find it useful if your primary works best at range.
*I know you get your tier nine at level 38, but this power needs more than the base slot.
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Sorry, they're a joke in bad taste. I have a very nicely slotted one (all inventions, working on purples, T4 alpha) and it's easily outperformed by pretty much any of my Scrappers or Brutes. The AT is mathematically overly penalized for being a "hybrid" despite, say, my Kinetic Melee or Claws characters being just as much "hybrids" and having no such penalty. As with any other MMO there is simply no room here for a character type that does many things badly and nothing well, and that's Peacebringers summed up.
| I personally believe the PB's to be one of the best AT when you know how to play it. |
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
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"Very nicely slotted" doesn't equal "well played". I've seen them tear through @#$% like there's no tomorrow.
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Originally Posted by Venture
Sorry, they're a joke in bad taste. I have a very nicely slotted one (all inventions, working on purples, T4 alpha) and it's easily outperformed by pretty much any of my Scrappers or Brutes. The AT is mathematically overly penalized for being a "hybrid" despite, say, my Kinetic Melee or Claws characters being just as much "hybrids" and having no such penalty. As with any other MMO there is simply no room here for a character type that does many things badly and nothing well, and that's Peacebringers summed up.
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Virtue Server
Avatar art by Daggerpoint
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Haven't teamed with Canadian Girl or Steel Hoof in a few days... but I see others around on Virtue. For all its flaws Granite Armor is still pretty awesome.|
Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
I mean, when was the last time you saw a Stone or Ice tank? They used to be relatively common, until a slew of powersets that were 1)Up to date with mechanics and activation/end costs etc and, 2) simply bloomin' better.
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Originally Posted by Hercules
Out of the sets I've played:
1. Ranged Damage - Ice. Has decent single target damage, but AE leaves something to be desired. And out of all the crappy snipe powers, this one is the worst - a long range hold with minimal damage - wow! Plays more like a controller set than ranged damage, since everything is centered around "slow". |
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| 2. Scrapper Primary - dual blades. Dual Blades has mediocre damage, and I've never been a fan of the combo system in this game. |
Also, you're going to see a lot of dual blade scrappers and brutes once the space pirate costumes appear... regardless of how "meh" it might be. ^_^
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| 3. Brute Primary - TW. TW is just too frigging slow, by the time you've wound up your attack, your target is usually dead from someone else. PLus with the slow speed, hard to get rage up. |
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| 4. Scrapper Secondary - Fire or Regen. Both have low survivability. |
my lil RWZ Challenge vid
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The sad thing is I remember when /regen pretty much out-performed everything. It had problems with heavy alpha strikes, but if it survived that, it was unstoppable. Then they scaled down the regeneration bonus of IH, added one to Integration ( but the total still fell lower ), and made IH a click with a long-*** recharge. That pretty much killed /regen. |
Originally Posted by Organica
Both benefit from IOs, and fire is still a popular choice because of the damage aura... but yeah, any set that requires IOs to be brought up to speed has problems, and regen in particular. One reason I don't play my /regen scrappers Mouse Police and Organica and Maiden Knight much anymore.
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Virtue Server
Avatar art by Daggerpoint
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my ice/ice tank says hi right back. play him regularly, very good control, multiple auras get me tons of aggro, and witht he change to freezing aura, his aoe is pretty good.
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Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
Ice and Stone armours say hi
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I have never once, in all the years I've played, seen any Kheldian of either type do anything on any team that was the slightest bit exceptional. And I've been complimented on my own play many, many times so I have no reason to believe my own skills are somehow deficient.
| "Very nicely slotted" doesn't equal "well played". I've seen them tear through @#$% like there's no tomorrow. |
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
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Not arguing your opinion, but I have different experience with my PB. Although I'm not the best PB player and my experience is limited to just the 1 in the mid 30s, but I always felt I had the tools needed to get the job done. Vs a Corruptor or Blaster, I had the tools to blow up spawns and survive plenty good. Vs a Brute or Scrapper, I felt I had the versatility to add to a team while being capable of strong and wider burst strikes than either.|
Originally Posted by Venture
Sorry, they're a joke in bad taste. I have a very nicely slotted one (all inventions, working on purples, T4 alpha) and it's easily outperformed by pretty much any of my Scrappers or Brutes. The AT is mathematically overly penalized for being a "hybrid" despite, say, my Kinetic Melee or Claws characters being just as much "hybrids" and having no such penalty. As with any other MMO there is simply no room here for a character type that does many things badly and nothing well, and that's Peacebringers summed up.
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Of course there will be outliers like /Time corruptors being just as or more survivable or Elec/SD Scraps/Brutes who could get just a big a burst strike, but none of that spreads to every corruptor, scrapper or brute combo. But every PB can achieve the versatility I've experienced and IOs and slotting can definitely make it even better.
Beside that, on teams with other PBs, it'd hard to deny their contributions when things just die and they don't.
And I'd hardly call Kinetic or Claws hybrids. While they have range, it's pathetic. And no matter what you do, as a Claws/Kinetic, you're *worse* at range on every account than if you were in melee. But like some Blasters, a PB is great on any front, ranged or melee.
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Originally Posted by Darth_Khasei
I knew once the hate really got going the defense posts would start. Let's see where this goes from here.
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Someone come tell me why Claws on Stalkers is worth anything. I'll mark down why I feel the way I do about the set:
-Claws is a DPS set, no 'if's 'and's or 'but's. Yet it's probably the worst at it than several Stalker primary sets.
-It sacrifices DPS when ported to Stalkers and gets nothing to compensate for it. I.e. Follow Up is a great source of DPS and adds some damage to boot...but you lose that for BU which is on all accounts inferior to FU. What about the extra damage FU does? Where is that added back?
-It's all lethal damage. While I don't think enemy resistances should factor in how sets are balanced, Dark Melee will most likely outperform Claws' DPS just on account of it being resisted less.
-Claws has one source of 100% Assassin's Focus and that's Shockwave. It's highest chance other than that is 95% and this is due to being penalized by how AF is distributed (he recharge of the power...which Claws naturally has lower recharge). On the other hand, Dark Melee has 2 100% AF attacks, Siphon Life and Midnight Grasp, 2 attack you most likely will be attempting to use as fast and often as possible. Martial Arts has 4(!!!) 100% AF attacks.
-Now the AoE...I generally don't use Shockwave as a primary AoE attack. I use it as either an opening salvo or a counter to an alpha strike but I can use it as extra damage coupled with soft control for the purpose of weedeating through a few foes to make it easier to survive. That SW is the sets only AoE isn't the kick in the teeth, it's that it *wasn't* its only AoE but is *now*. Take the cone out of Eviscerate and now the set is even more garbage to other DPS sets *especially* when one compares it to other ATs that use claws. Martial Arts? It doesn't matter what AT you use that on, the AoE is pretty meh so Stalker MA is still 'meh'er for that, but it *makes up* for it with burst and improved DPS. Claws isn't doing that for Stalkers...not without Follow Up or compensation for its absence. And Claws is decent for AoE with everybody else but abysmal for Stalkers to boot.
Going down the list, there is no primary for Stalkers that isn't even half as penalized. Even Energy Melee makes out with a quick strong hit of DPS with the Assassin's Focus that other EM ATs can't get. Claws comes out worse on every front...and I say this with a lvl50 claws (well lvl46 for Stalker) character of each AT under my belt. I know, as a claws, it can be a pain to scratch at resistant foes for all of them but it's even more painful for Stalkers who also take a hit on AoE.
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Bad luck, then? The great ones are rare, but, then, so are great players in general. They're underplayed specifically because there's a steep learning curve to them. I don't like them myself. But, that does not mean that the AT is bad once you learn the ins and outs of them.
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Originally Posted by Venture
I have never once, in all the years I've played, seen any Kheldian of either type do anything on any team that was the slightest bit exceptional. And I've been complimented on my own play many, many times so I have no reason to believe my own skills are somehow deficient.
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Virtue Server
Avatar art by Daggerpoint
Personally I'd have to say Trick Arrow, especially when you compare it to Traps which does almost everything Trick Arrow can do better.
Electric Blast needs something to make it as worthwhile as the other ranged sets too.
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I heart Defenders
My vote goes to Stone Armor. It's the only set in the game that makes me regret playing it even when everything is going right. It's just... extraordinarily un-fun. I run slower than the rest of the group walks ("follow the tank" is really annoying when the tank has to keep saying "hey guys, wait up..."), I can't jump, and it's mutually exclusive with almost everything that isn't itself.
Any set that's only fun when paired with another specific set (Kinetics) is a bad set. If that other set requires a whole second player because you can't put the two together on the same character, it's even worse.
FUN FACT: That burst of light when you level up is actually the effectiveness escaping from your enhancements all at once.
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Originally Posted by AmityCal
Personally I'd have to say Trick Arrow, especially when you compare it to Traps which does almost everything Trick Arrow can do better.
Electric Blast needs something to make it as worthwhile as the other ranged sets too. |
I call TA Trap Sticks.
Because that is what they are and their about 1/2 as good.
Captain Den'Rath 53* Merk/Traps MM, Rivona 50Energy Blast/Time Cor,Victoria Von Heilwig 53* Dual Pistols/Traps Cor, Crab Spider Webguard 53* SOA, Accela 53* Bot/FF MM,Valkyrie's Executor 53* Broadsword/Shield Def Scrap. On FREEDOM! @Knight Of Bronze
"Hypocrisy, the human inherent." "Let not this work be wasted, apply yourself always."
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I respect your opinion, but as a PB only player (yes I basically only play my pb because its the most well rounded and awesome toon out there) I am basically a regen blaster. |
Originally Posted by Ein_Dose
Okay this isn't the point of the thread, but I'm gonna just quickly use my Peacebringer experience to shoot you down.
-Since one heal is an ally heal and one is a self heal, it's more like one heal either way. Neither of them are good. -You can't make an attack chain out of two 'great' melees. Trust me, I tried. -You need more than a single res toggle to have any sort of staying power. -Blasts actually aren't very good. They do chain, though. -I tried them, the AoEs aren't very good either. -Inherent flight's not that much of a bonus these days, since every build can spare a slot for a travel power and even the ones that don't can get Ninja Run. -Photon Seekers are pretty good, but that's one good, unique power in twenty-seven. -Actually there's two, and I can tell you aren't even very good as a Peacebringer because you didn't take it into account, Light Form is pretty great nowadays but doesn't really make up for the rest. |
I have reconstruction and dull pain - that makes 2 great heals.
With melee, expecially in pvp, I'll use the Incandescent strike and Gleaming blast follow up by anything. RInse repeat. Or switch it up for faster DPS.
If I am not very good on my pb as you may think, you should come to freedom and see what a real PB is.
Yeah, I mainly pvp. And I wreck. A pb, that is very well known, and can make people afraid to leave the base. Still think they're terrible? Come meet Next Spirit. He thinks otherwise my friend.
Yeah im so bad..lol
I just found out how to run the archetype correctly. Unlike many others. There are some of us good PB's out there. Just rare because most people dont have a clue what to do with the set.
PS - I'm all human form.
Fight The Power
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I can out perform or at least match up with all scrappers and most brutes. (I am not aoe heavy)|
Originally Posted by Venture
Sorry, they're a joke in bad taste. I have a very nicely slotted one (all inventions, working on purples, T4 alpha) and it's easily outperformed by pretty much any of my Scrappers or Brutes. The AT is mathematically overly penalized for being a "hybrid" despite, say, my Kinetic Melee or Claws characters being just as much "hybrids" and having no such penalty. As with any other MMO there is simply no room here for a character type that does many things badly and nothing well, and that's Peacebringers summed up.
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So.. busted.
You just need to know how to run the AT correctly. It really matters.
Fight The Power
Energy Melee. Because it was created before the concept of animation times affecting set balance existed in the Dev Team's mind, and then that same concept, once it was discovered, was used to absolutely destroy the set's playability because they still didn't fully understand the concept.
Almost every other set that experiences flaws can be corrected with proper IO slotting or Power Pool choices. Energy Melee doesn't have that benefit because it's largest two crippling flaws can't be "built around" or minimized, and the flaws actually effectively destroy the set's calling card in a team environment for everything -except- AV/EB fights.
Those two flaws? Lack of effective AoE, and Animation times.
The lack of effective AoE means that in the team environment, you have to rely on your single target attacks.
The excessive animation times on the set's worthwhile attacks wind up leaving you "Corpse Blasting" the majority of the time in the team environment, as you will queue attacks to kill a target, and before the attack finishes and damage is applied, your target will be dead from errant AoE or someone using a faster, more effective attack.
And you can't get more AoE with power picks prior to epic pools, and you can't do anything to adjust Animation times, so you're forced to just deal with it, or play another set.
It'd be nice to see the current team try to repair the damage done to the set by Castle/BaBs but I'm not going to keep playing the set waiting for it to be done, when there's better options.