Ben_Arizona

Sure, but as other people have pointed out, I think the practical results that'll be interesting to most non-theorycrafters are in applying the things you do for a petless mastermind to a pet-having mastermind so that when his pets wipe he doesn't feel too bothered.

To frame it in other terms: the next logical idea would be to make a MM who has spent the power picks for the five pet-focused powers (summons and upgrades) but is perfectly capable of rolling petless without problems.

More important than "how does it compare to other archetypes stock": is he more effective than he would be if you'd put in as much effort and then actually taken your pet powers? I suspect I know the answer, but congratulations on going to extremes with pools, IOs, and a secondary I guess.

Actually, I'm pretty sure the counterbalance to not having Build Up is "supposed to be" the massive damage on Trip Mine and Time Bomb. I do think Devices could use some work (a little more meat on Smoke Grenade's debuff would go a long way, for example) but I think it could survive another set having a +acc toggle.

My suggestion is cribbing Focused Accuracy and Physical Perfection from scrappers' Body Mastery. A version of Dragon's Tail (perhaps with expanded area? It's been a while since I played a MA scrapper) would also nicely distinguish it from Energy Melee, probably pushing out one of the harder-hitting ST attacks.

No, but you did choose to characterize the statement that someone didn't find redside "that interesting" as actually meaning in some way "I'm comfortable with mediocrity".

Yes, I get it, you don't like blue as much as red, but if you sort through this thread (or basically any "which side do you like?" thread) you will find an inordinate number of personal attacks based on what amounts to a matter of personal taste. Now, granted, I would say there are blueside posters in this thread being jackasses too, but it seems to be the ground-level assumption among redside supporters that there is no possible reason short of mental deficiency to play a hero.

Several Minutes Later

Okay, so I just looked through this entire thread, and I have half an apology to offer. Why half? Well, first, I do need to offer something, because I was looking specifically for posts that offered personal attacks rather than actually talking about why they liked red vs. blue or vice versa. I have to apologize because this thread, other than Humility and the people flaming back at him, has been rather civil in that regard - people have had strong words about blue or red, but mainly directed at actual complaints of at least arguable substance. And Humility, yeah, you're being a jackass for blueside, thanks a lot there mate.

So why only half? Because one of the few personal attacks I found outside that line of discussion:

..is by the same person who "isn't the one who resorted to name-calling". Oops I guess?


I do feel that there is a generally pervasive tone of smugness in red vs. blue discussions, but outside of the Humility Vs. The World flamefest here this thread has been pretty civil (and admittedly Humility Vs. The World has largely taken over this thread). Mea culpa on that; I was venting frustrations from other threads in one that didn't entirely merit it.

Have I mentioned that one of the reasons I spend less time redside than blue is because so many redside boosters are complete jackasses about it?

Fire/rad isn't a bad choice, but bear in mind that immobs won't actually prevent the AV from beating you senseless. Like I said, you're going to need a plan B other than "mez AV, get candy".

How much you have to sacrifice partly depends on how much inf you have to throw at the problem. If you can make it all or most of the way on set bonuses that's great, but the Fighting pool, Maneuvers, and extra picks to mule cheaper sets can chew into primary/secondary power picks pretty hard when they're added on top of the three-power Stamina tax.

Not just the tier 9. Archvillains have a special ability that essentially comes down to extremely-high-magnitude mez protection which is on more often than it's off. If you time it right, you could probably hold one for a short time while it's down, but their protection will come back up and at that point you will need a plan B that isn't mezzing them.

If it were that easy, nobody would make much of AV soloing.

This reminds me that as much as I love Super Jump in zones that run smoothly, any time my connection has a little lag or my framerate is down, Super Jump becomes a nightmare to navigate with. At least with Fly or Super Speed you'll just float or stand there respectively when your input lags or drops for a moment; with Super Jump you drop like a stone.

I had one teleporter, but teleporting goes from awkward to awful on a laptop with a touchpad. My first respec trial was undertaken for the specific purpose of changing over to flight, and I changed her costume around to accomodate rocket boots.

Even in the skyscraper parts of Steel Canyon, enough of them have ledges that it's easy to keep gaining height and making relatively clear jumps even if you're not going in a straight line towards your target (you can bounce off the windows on most of them, too, if you don't mind looking silly). I love superjumping through Steel Canyon because I'm almost always going from skyscraper top to skyscraper top by the time I'm out of midtown, and that's just fun.

Yeah, it's better to slap it on people coming off trains, or people you just randomly see in the street.

I also enjoy buffing the random roaming Longbow and PPD, even if it does make them freak out a little.

Let me guess: never read Green Arrow's solo book or Green Lantern/Green Arrow?

Kill them faster than they kill you. Don't be afraid to eat a purple inspiration - that's what they're there for. Use the mitigation tools at your disposal - /energy's stuns or /ice's Ice Patch, for instance. If you're not dead set on being a "pure" blapper, fall back and take advantage of range when things get too sticky. A fairly popular mixed style is to use AoEs to mow down minions, then move in and wreck the bosses with your hard-hitting melee attacks.

Redside actually has more single-player Kheldian-related content than blueside, bizarrely enough. (Again, leaving aside the Kheldian-only contacts - talking only about content which can be accessed before creating an epic AT character.) In addition to the PPD Awakened Division, which as you note are never seen blueside, Abyss in Grandville has the "Light and Darkness" arc, where you fight Sunstorm along with some other Kheld NPCs.

Mixing in some "Galaxy Awakened" with the Council along with some missions to learn about them might ground the Nictus a little more firmly in that regard - it would be something, at least. Alternately, with the Fifth Column returned, some Awakened Uebermenschen to counteract the Galaxy division would be interesting, again with added contact storyline to find out what this new 5C weapon is.

Any solution that works will anger people who spent massive amounts of inf making themselves untouchable.

I'm not proposing necessarily reducing the benefits from a given set, but rather setting a specific value of maximum possible total IO bonus to any given defense. The value would ideally be one that is just high enough that it allows players with defense-oriented sets to reach the softcap, while still restricting characters who are starting from nothing to "only" a major increase in survivability. (Don't forget that a blaster who "only" has 15% defense, for example, is still taking about 30% less damage than he would without IO bonuses, and isn't giving up any of his other survival tools or much if any of his offense.)