Devs called I24 "Fix Everything" in Coffee Talk... Lets hope that doesn't include nerfs

Super Strength is, again, just a convenient example. I'm not talking about its design structure at all. Hence: "I'd say the same of the Tier 1 attack in any of the attack sets for any AT that has one."

Name another AT that gets Plant Control and Poison.


As I've explained numerous times, 0.8 is fine with me. I can even find thematic justification for it. It's the 400% that I take issue with.


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Personally, I'd peg her as Plant Control/Nature Affinity, but that still leaves her a Controller.

How about "role playing" versus "twitch?" And your description of CoX combat is pretty far off the mark anyway.

Regardless, those games are really weird things to reference if you're upset about CoX not modeling comic books. Game #2 is awful at it because Power Sets are treated as Classes. As I recall, at launch it didn't even HAVE a Invulnerability set (and I think it still doesn't). The game suggests building super strength characters using the Ice powerset! And it's so rigid that Electric and Plant characters are always healers, Fire and Ice are always tanks... wow that game was just terrible.

That's irrelevant. I didn't say prove Poison Ivy uses a plant based power. I said to prove she was a City of Heroes controller.


What's the buff cap in comic books?

When the producers decide to allocate an issue to do all things not horrible, I would not oppose buffing the tanker damage cap as being one of them.

While I understand your intent, your example of Jab still skews the comment. It's akin to using Blaine Gabbert, Jacksonville's Quarterback last year, as a median example of the 2011 NFL Quarterback performances. He ranked 34th out of 34 NFL starting Quarterbacks for last season. Because of that, he doesn't represent the median of NFL Quarterback performances for last year. Just like Jab doesn't represent the average tier 1 attack.

Originally Posted by PapaSlade Rangle's right....this is fun.

I wouldn't oppose it, but a higher damage cap isn't going to lift Tankers up much higher than where they are. I think the issue most of us have is not with the Tanker damage caps per se and more with posters who characterize Tankers as abysmal and pathetic characters unable to fight their way out of a wet paper bag. The language used to describe Tankers doesn't match the nature of the buff request.

Not horrible. But it gives benefits to a smaller portion of the tank player base compared to say, upping the dmg mod for tanks. Some tanks can reach the current cap on their own on a fairly consistent basis.(My SD/SS tank with double stacked Rage and surrounded by critters is a great example of this.) A WP/Stone tank wouldn't see as much of a benefit on a regular basis without outside buffs.

Originally Posted by PapaSlade Rangle's right....this is fun.

Not sure if this is some when pigs fly snark or if your genuinely saying your ok with them having a higher cap.


As for everyone else commenting about my previous post, I just figured it would be a way to throw tankers a bone without giving them too much.

I've been asking for a 145% increase. That and a new thematic combat mechanic (damage oriented or not) to give Tankers some "flash" and improve their thematic failings would reasonably fix Tankers as far as I'm concerned.

I'm actuallyopposed to giving Tankers a straight damage increase by upping their damage scalar. It's not exactly balanced and frankly, boring and not as thematically suitable as something else.

But we're not even fighting about that, because some people, Arcana among them apparently, don't even nessisarily oppose what I'm asking for.

In other words, we're arguing the "why" more than the "what", and everyone always seems up for a good comic book argument, so I'm glad to oblige.



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If i had to guess i'd say a little from column A and a little from column B.

That's a point in that it would give most Tanker combinations very little in normal gameplay, but would give a few combinations quite a bit. My SD/SS would see far more benefit from the change than my FA/SM.

To save me having to read through your entire post history, why 145? I like our 3 tiered system. Which goes from top to bottom as "raging monster", "tough guys", and "support characters".

Thematically Tankers are supposed to be the most durable melee archetype around while doing less damage than the other melee archetypes. That is their theme by design. (Now, you may feel that Tankers should be both tougher and deal more damage than any other archetype, but in any game designed primarily around combat by someone not completely unconcerned with fairness or balance that is a non-starter.) Since the other melee archetypes can come close to Tanker survivability, and even equal it in most ordinary combat situations*, that implies that you want Tankers to be even more durable than they presently are.



*This generally requires usage of IO sets when comparing like powersets. If you feel that that means Tankers should be able to use IOs to increase damage as a sort of parity/counterbalance to other ATs gaining increased survivability from IOs then an increase in the damage cap and increased damage bonuses from sets would make sense. However, that would not be addressing a "thematic failing" since the Tanker's theme is that with great survivability comes reduced damage.




(i do not put a point specifically at the end of my posts, or if i do i make it a point that actually contains information.)

My guess is that Johnny just sucks at playing tanks.

She and pretty much -most- Superheroes don't fit a single AT mold. Especially characters like Ivy who, if they were a character would have Plant Control, Thorn assault, Poison, AND Nature Affinity.

Honestly I think it's silly to try assigning AT roles to heroes when so many of our own signature characters break them.

By my at-a-Mids-glance reckoning, if Jab takes 5-6 attacks, most other Tier 1 attacks for a Tanker should take 4-5 (which, I believe is similar to Jab with Rage). Given my statement that it shouldn't take more than two Tier 1 attacks for most minions, the difference is moot. I clearly wasn't attempting to represent the average attack, I was saying that the whole setup is bunk in my opinion.

Haven't gotten a hardcore Scrapper to 50 yet. I did get a Broadsword/Shield Scrapper, Zulu Time, to level 44 in the Iron Eagles before a trio of Master Illusionists defeated him. He didn't have significant IO defense bonuses, either (I mostly Frankenslotted his powers). That was some time back.

I do have the Unmitigated Gaul to try again, though. (He's another BS/Shield Scrap rising in the ranks at 29.)

The problem is that IF Tankers are currently imbalanced, then a disproportionate buff intra-Tank may not be the best solution. Raising their base damage mod would affect all Tanker sets evenly, but would still leave Johnny with hitting the cap on a number of his Tankers, which would likely still be a sore spot for him. But meanwhile, raising the caps only would leave a lot of other Tankers feeling like absolutely no change was made, since they're not routinely at the caps.

The bigger problem is that the players really don't know if there is an issue at all, and if there is, what that problem is. We just don't have the data to back up the claims of where the problem is. So we can throw out ideas all day long. Maybe some of them are good, maybe some of them are bad. But until the problem is known, the ideas are just shots in the dark.

Johnny and others say that Brutes and Scrappers don't die enough to justify the difference in Tanker offense compared to them. But we really have no idea how much more often the average Brute or Scrapper dies compared to a Tanker. If Brutes and Scrappers are dying 25% more than Tankers, would the people saying that their isn't a noticeable survivability difference take that to heart? Would it mean anything at all, in reality? I don't know, really.

But basically, if the Devs did look at Tankers compared to the other melee ATs, and saw all of the numbers, and found that they are performing exactly where they should be, would it stop people asking for a buff for them? No, probably not. Even if the Devs came to us and said that over the course of the game, Tankers were outputting 75% of the damage of Scrappers in real terms, and dying 25% less (which is exactly what should be happening), I doubt it would stop the complaints.

And in those cases, I'm betting that the Iron Eagles has some of every AT in there, right? How many more are Tankers than Scrappers and Brutes? Are those Controllers and Defenders that are in there a problem for Tankers? I've yet to see anyone make that claim, but if the issue is that Scrappers and Brutes don't die enough, then if the same is true of other ATs, then it should be a problem as well.



For those saying that as Heroes, we should be able to take down a minion in one or two swings, doesn't that mean that the LOWEST damage AT should be able to do that? So if the lowest damage AT should be able to take down a minion in potentially one hit, what then is the point of doing MORE damage than that? It would all be overkill at that point. So you'd be replacing a potential survivability insignificant difference with an offensive one.

Pam doesn't grow thorns from her body and fling them and she doesn't use flowers to heal anyone so Thorn Assault and Nature Affinity are out. She's a Plant/Poison Controller. Maybe one could make a case for a Plant/Poison MM if such a set existed.


Honestly, I think ATs are silly period and I can't say my experience is better for them. I recognize they're good for new players and were intended to prevent them from gimping themselves, and there's definitely value in that, but to me they're nothing but a straitjacket that prevents me from realizing an otherwise reasonable concept, like a character with guns and swords, or a character like classic Iron Man. It's made worse by the fact that 8 years in, the devs have done little to create more ATs to fill those gaps aside from ultra concept-specific EATs, and I don't think they have any intention to.


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I've never seen her hurl and spit poison at any significant range. Now, if you could combine the aesthetics of Nature Affinity with the debuffing focus of Poison, that'd probably be the best.