Biowraith

I'm miffed that I can't fire Gloom from my face

My memory is somewhat hazy, but:

I can't remember where I first heard about the game, or whether I just stumbled across it, but I found the website quite some time before the game was actually released. It sounded pretty cool - the idea of designing and customizing my own hero appealed to me quite a bit (both thematically and mechanically), and there really wasn't much else similar at the time.

Not sure what I'd have been playing at the time. Possibly I was still playing a couple MUDs (Avatar, Aardwolf), but I think I may have ventured into commercial MMO's by then, in which case probably Neocron or Anarchy Online.

With no release date at that time I lost interest fairly quickly (I'm not the type to follow a game religiously from announcement up until release - if I'm not able to actually play it I go do other things), until a few weeks before release I re-discovered it (again, I don't remember how/why), got into open beta, created Biowraith, thoroughly enjoyed myself, and I've been playing ever since.

Having Dark Miasma as my main was interesting, as I got to see it go from one of the gimpier Defender sets to one of the strongest. I also seem to remember one of the Rad toggles having unlimited range and doing damage over time on top of the debuffs. You can imagine the results...

My personal list of mobs I always eliminate first, whether teamed or solo:

CoT Ruin Mage
CoT Spectral Lord (not necessarily kill, but mez to turn off their chill of night)
Tsoo Sorcerer (heals, teleport, hurricane, chill of night)
Malta Sapper (-end)
Malta Operations Officer (silly long duration stun grenades)
PPD Equalizer (glue grenade - not deadly, but really really annoying)
Carnie Ring Mistress (mask of vitiation)
Cimeroran Immunes Surgeon (heals)
Arachnos Night Widow (smoke grenade)
Arachnos Tarantula Mistress (autohit -def/-perc debuff)
Rikti Communications Officer (just a tag to stop them creating their portal)
Sky Raider Engineer (just a tag to stop them creating their ffg)
Devouring Earth Granite (cairns)
Devouring Earth Cairn
Devouring Earth Guardian (quartz)
Devouring Earth Quartz
Vahzilok Embalmed
Banished Pantheon Storm Shaman
Banished Pantheon Avalanche Shaman


That's all I can think of off-hand. Each group has plenty of others that are higher priority than average, but the above are the ones that I have to kill/mez *right now*.

The vast majority of mine remain unchanged from 1-50, and most of the time that I *do* make adjustments it's because a new costume piece has come out that would have been ideal if it'd been available when I created the character. Even then the adjustments are usually performed on a 2nd (or 3rd, 4th) costume slot and the first one stays untouched (even if I never use it again).

I've only got two or three characters (out of about 40) where I've made a significantly different alternate costume and have ended up preferring it over the original.

Short version: it's a bug that is visual only; underneath it all the enhancements are operating the way you'd normally expect them to.

Fwiw, with a non-specialized build I had a bash at that pylon test. Without pets out it was close to a stalemate - I *might* have brought it down eventually, but the time would have probably been in the hours rather than minutes.

My first attempt using pets the health bar started moving more noticeably... for a few seconds before my pets decided to all join me in melee and got killed by the pylon's AoE.

My final attempt I went without melee attacks and sat back so the pets wouldn't get killed by collateral damage. This attempt was successful, clocking in at 8m44s - not especially impressive by that thread's standards, but not too shabby considering my build and the circumstances (only one single target ranged attack, no aim, no assaults - though some of that will change when fitness goes inherent).

So yeah, pets. Use 'em.

Although it's obviously not as high as e.g. a Bane, I don't have too much issue with my Crab's single target damage.

Generally I ensure the target is debuffed by Venom Grenade at all times, and otherwise use Arm Lash, Channelgun, and Slice to fill the gaps; I know some will be appalled at 2 melee attacks and no Longfang, so don't think I'm advocating melee specifically here, it's just the path I took (my Crab is called Pinchy, so he needs to be able to "pinch").

Now by itself this may or may not be a bit slow, depending on what I'm fighting, but that's where the pets come in: I have Spiderlings out perma (not too hard to accomplish) and Call Reinforcements up often enough that it's likely to be available for any hard targets (long term goal is to perma them, or close to it). When there's just the one hard target (i.e. no trash to distract them) the pets add a good amount of dps and things speed up to much more pleasing levels.

Of course it all depends on your opinion as to what constitutes "struggle" and how fast is fast enough, but once I got the pets on my build I found hard targets ceased to be an issue.

APP/PPP - 8
Hasten - 7
The rest of the Pools - 4
Khelds & VEATs - 2

A minor point, but I think *most* of the dismay at missing TT:M is with Crab/Bane/Wolf rather than with Widows. i.e. there's not the alternative option of Mind Link and their TT:M is a base 10% unenhanced (for reference, a Super Reflexes toggle is 13.88% unenhanced). That's not to say that Widow TT:M isn't very nice, just that it's the Soldier one that's truly exceptional.

At least in the case of the Soldier version, at the level it's available there's just very little that provides as much of a boost - solo or teamed - as TT:M (which may or may not be a balance issue). Hell, at *any* level there's not much that competes with its effectiveness - certainly not so many equivalent alternatives that you need to sacrifice theme or utility to fit it in.



Also, while it is possible to find yourself on teams with so much existing +def that your TT:M isn't doing much (though the volume of -def out there means there's a fair chance it's doing *something*), unless you always know who you'll be teamed with it's generally a safer bet that +def will be helpful vs the other buffs (team or personal) open to an SoA. Struggling with survivability tends to hurt pickup teams more than struggling with dps (though obviously neither is ideal), and at least in my experience it's more common for a pickup team to be lacking in the former than the latter. And it's not like you can't overkill in every other aspect of a team too, anyway.

There's also some lfg-sounding commands appeared in /cmdlist that I don't *think* were there before -

lfg_request_event_list Request LFG system event list
lfg_queue_for_events Queue for events in LFG system
lfg_remove_from_queue Remove me or my team / league from LFG queue
lfg_event_response Accept / reject offer to join event

Also a "Looking for Group" channel among the default channel options.

My guess is something relating to the incarnate "endgame content".

It technically shouldn't be able to hit enemies that are behind you as it's a 180 degree arc to the front. That said, it's got such a wide "cone" that it gets a little fuzzy sometimes when everything's really bunched up around you (I'm guessing that maybe although the graphic for the enemy is behind you, their "hitbox" may extend a little beyond that such that it can be partially placed within the front arc).

But I just meant for determining whether it'll crit or not.

Some version of Poison for Corruptors is the main one I'm waiting for.

To an extent it depends how quickly you're getting from 1-22, and whether you're soloing it or or teaming. Some folks blaze through those levels so fast it doesn't matter what they've got slotted, so why spend the time/inf. Or if you're exclusively teaming the strengths of your teammates will cover any poorly slotted powers you might have. I think I'd find soloing a bit of a chore if I were doing it without any enhancing once I'm in the teens though.

Certainly pre-IOs a lot of people waited until 22 since - unless you had a high level alt feeding inf down - it'd be a struggle to afford a full set of SOs, so every drop of inf counted. Now though, inf is easier to come by (if you utilise the market to any degree) and personally I don't have any trouble affording at least generic IOs (and/or frankenslotting cheap sets) at 22, so I'll happily kit out before then.

My own Crab generally opens with Venom Grenade, or Omega then Venom if it looks to be a troublesome spawn. Then I cycle Suppression, Frag, Venom so long as they're at range and there's still minions/lts alive. Anything that gets close gets Arm Lashed, and if the fight lasts long enough to matter I may back around a corner to re-gather the spawn. I used to have Bile Spray in my AoE chain and I did kill faster as a result, but I dropped it for the Fighting Pool which has improved my overall success rate. I don't have an immob, but largely for thematic reasons - I'd try to make room for a crab-arm-launched web grenade if one were available.

Re: Pets, my experience of x8 was that the pets usually didn't survive long enough to matter much (though admittedly I was fighting Malta most of the time). I suppose they offer a bit of aggro distraction, but they can also split up the spawn a bit as a result.

Definitely pick up Tactical Training: Maneuvers at the first opportunity. That plus CT: Defensive will give you a healthy amount of ranged defense, and that's before adding in set bonuses etc. Plus it's a nice contribution to any teams you join.

Unless you have a specific IO plan for it, drop Wolf Spider Armor - it's pretty much redundant when you have Crab Armor Upgrade and Fortification.

Arm Lash is fairly good, especially if you leverage the melee-cone aspect. But generally try to keep out of melee range and kite stuff, as your defenses are stronger vs ranged.

It's worth adding other sources of +def to edge you closer to the soft cap, whether that's via IO sets or pool powers like Combat Jumping or Hover (tho it's not worth wasting slots on enhancing the defense, the base amount is decent given the low endurance cost and that it's stacked on your more substantial CC and TT:M powers). For extra durability consider the fighting pool or leadership pool maneuvers (though both options will probably make endurance an issue).

If you're not at the defense soft cap, keep a handful of purple insps for EBs - two small purples will basically cap your ranged defense to them when layered over your other powers (even one should get you real close to the cap).

Also you should find soloing gets a bit easier once (if) you pick up the pets, as they draw a bit of aggro and increase your single target dps a bit.

Nothing particularly original or revolutionary for me:

LFM flag/search, with self-invite capability (possibly with the ability to define criteria as to who you're accepting that way).

Offline SG invites (I liked the via email suggestion, would hopefully help with potential invite spammers).

Increased the number of global channels you can join (I play on 3 different servers and trying to fit in the relevant channels for each *and* a couple private channels for my friends is tough).

Not really QoL, but I'd also like to see [a chance for] various mid-mission random ambushes, encounters, etc added to paper/radio missions to spice them up a bit.

I play windowed (but maximised).

Browser and Mids Hero Planner in the background to switch to during loading screens, quiet periods, or when waiting for teammates to hurry the hell up.

In-game sound at 10% (*just* loud enough to here that an effect has fired) with mp3s playing over the top.

Almost all pickup groups, usually joining rather than forming, and ideally with 6-8 members. Preference for contact missions, but will run radio/paper if that's all that's on offer. TFs if one happens to be forming on a global channel that's in a range of a character I want to play.

Most of my existing characters will stick to the side they're on (I have a roughly equal number of heroes and villains). One or two will go grey, but I don't think any will cross over completely.

I also have a bunch of placeholder characters that have been waiting in the wings for the last couple years - they will switch as soon as possible (and/or start Praetorian).