Chrondeath

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I've said this in other threads, but it's actually Hasten that causes the need for Stamina in most builds. I really don't think people really comprehend the massive amount of endurance you chew through with Perma Hasten.

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No, it's freakin' not.

Hasten doesn't do anything to your DPE; all it does is increase your DPS. DPE is what really determines whether you'll be running out of endurance during the fight or not. The only way Hasten hurts your endurance consumption is that you lose the slight amount of endurance you would have recovered during the extra time you spent on the fight because your DPS sucked without Hasten--and heck, if you really need that extra endurance to finish the fight, you can sit there not attacking for the amount of time you need to recover that endurance. If you've got the same DPE and endurance recovery as the guy without Hasten, you'll STILL finish the fight before him even though you ran out of endurance, because the same DPE says it'll take you both the same amount of endurance to finish and the same endurance recovery says that'll take the same amount of time to accumulate. If the DPE guy's DPS is so low that he never runs out of endurance during the fight, the DPS guy is guaranteed to finish faster even if he runs out of endurance.

The only Hasten factor that's ignoring is the cost of Hasten itself, which is equivalent to running a cheap toggle (just broken up differently). If the claim is that the cost of Hasten itself causes the need for Stamina, it might have merit; the implication I usually get from these claims of the evils of Hasten is that the recharge bonus is to blame, which is blatantly false. I'm not even convinced that the cost of Hasten isn't paid back by things like:

Being able to adjust your attack chain to let a higher-DPE attack make up a larger percentage of your damage
Being able to turn off defensive toggles earlier because your higher DPS made you defeat enemies faster
Being able to use endurance-recovering powers more often (Consume, Dark Consumption, Stygian Circle, Conserve Power, Power Sink, Accelerate Metabolism, etc..)

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As a reward for a successful mission I can understand, but it strikes me as a little odd to have some guy on a street corner peddling this stuff.

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Psst! Hey, you. Over here.

You look like somebody who needs something, friend. I got all yer enhancement needs right here. Dangerous scientific experiments? Found 'em in a dumpster. Strange ways to make you mutate? Yeah, right here--and no, that writing's not Rikti, don't ask again. Connections to extradimensional entities? They fell off the back of a truck.

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It's like I've said before...

Stamina is like a Porsche. You certainly don't need one, but darned if it doesen't look nice in the garage.

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I would say Stamina (and Hasten for that matter) are more like a car, period. You could get around without one (walk, take the bus, or ride a bike), and depending on your situation, you can do very well, but having one lets you spend your time much more efficiently and worry about things other than "How do I get where I'm going?"

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Saved me the trouble. Making the game more annoying in an attempt to slow you down is not a challenge, it's just...well annoying.

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I would consider the removal of stores to be a huge annoyance. You're already penalized for choosing the wrong origin if you need non-Power-10 SOs and your origin-specific enemies don't like you (having gone through the 20s with two Magic-origin negative energy characters, I'm looking squarely at the Banished Pantheon for this). Having to go through that to get ANY SOs at all? Ugh.

I always go with Galaxy unless there's a starting contact I particularly want from Atlas.

And every time I start in Atlas, I'm reminded again of WHY I go with Galaxy, because I end up with a mission at level 3 to trek all the way to the west end of the map, over that huge dropoff into the level 6 territory.

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When doing these missions, either the thing gets saved, or there was never a chance to save it because it happens too fast.

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This has not been my experience on the Cape mission or the Respec trial. Every time I've been on a team that's failed one of those, it's because we got wiped at the glowie or reactor (or 90% wiped and the one guy who got away doesn't have time to rez everyone). That seems to me to be a reasonable standard--if you go down while protecting the thing, you lose.

I haven't run into many of the other protect missions yet, although I do remember one where the glowies did have the problem you're describing, in that it was nearly impossible to keep them from blowing up. (Strangely, this didn't cause the mission to fail; not sure if it was bugged or what.) I guess I'm just pointing out that if the reactor and the cape mission are okay, then the problem is that the other protect missions aren't balance properly, not that protect missions are just a broken concept.

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You could be doing prison detail escorting Super-Omega-Ultra-Badguy to another holding facility due to death threats from victims and despite the fact that he could destroy worlds, a few stray shots could bring him down.

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Must be a Blaster.

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These powers are so utterly conditional I have never and will never take them. Yeah, they can rock when you die. On a team. With a time constraint or really far from the nearest hospital.

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I took RotP at 49 on my Blaster, and I've been pretty happy with it. I like to play recklessly, so it usually saves at least a couple of load screens, and it was great for TFs in the Shadow Shard and for Hamidon raids. There were no defensive powers that I could get with a single power choice, and without heavy slotting there's nothing that would help my survival noticeably anyway, so it was the most useful of the bunch.

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I consider them novelties for level 50 heroes that had no useful powers to take at 49.

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This is a fair characterization, but it's been much more useful than I was expecting it to be. I do think it's much better as a Blaster power than a Tank or Regen power (seriously, what's the ratio on how often tanks or regen scrappers die vs. blasters?)

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Odds are that the AT will be coded so that the hostage:

1) doesn't move and you must clear the area
2) doesn't move and must be rescued
3) follows you at some distance
4) walks a pre-set path and you have to keep him/her alive

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5) Races headlong into the biggest pack of mobs it can find

...at least, that's how it usually feels during escort missions in other games....

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Rad and Dark. Dark can do everything except boost your endurance and comes with pets, rad can do everything except free you from mez(though it does halve your mez duration).

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Dark can free you from mez?

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Yeah that does suck. Defenders are getting more and more unneeded all the time. Groups would rather have control than weenie blasts.

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Then that's a balance issue, not a uniqueness issue. Having more unique sets wouldn't help that--if Controllers currently provide enough defense that teams think they don't need a Defender, why on earth would the teams change their minds because there's a new Defender that has different colors on his debuffs? Do you encounter many teams at high levels that say "We need a Controller because those Defenders are useless unless they're Dark/*"? If the existence of Dark/* defenders isn't a factor that teams consider when choosing a controller vs a defender, then adding more unique sets isn't going to help, either.

Now, if teams are really picking Controllers over Defenders for defense, that's probably a good argument that Controller secondaries need to be toned down (does every controller power really provide 80% of the benefit? I thought there were some that were identical.) But it's got nothing to do with the number of unique sets.

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That characters name is Wavelength.

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No idea if it's considered in the continuity or not, but I assume that's the same speedster Wavelength who shows up in Flashfire's bio in the Blaster walkthrough?

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personally, i didnt like the original series much because i felt that the writers and artists were a little too "kill-happy", and callous about showing people (especially unnamed heroes) run through the heart, or smashed under falling objects, and so on. most of it was in the background, but it was there.

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I don't remember any heroes dying before the end of the old series (and they weren't unnamed). Do you have something in particular you're thinking about?

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that, and the writer (mark waid, i believe) has, in my opinion, gone out of his way to insult and demean every single hero in paragon city.

that means you. and me.

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Agreed. I've felt this way since they put up the first chapter of the first issue as a teaser.

I can see why he wanted to get rid of the mediport system, but I really don't see how it was necessary to remove all powers at the same time, or to kill off dozens of heroes, or to make fun of the game for...being a game. The teleport system in the game isn't perfect; we encounter heroes several times who've died to one thing or another without the teleport system saving them. There's danger there already; point that out, and removing the mediport system isn't that huge of a shift. Certainly not something that requires a "We were all happy, incompetent bunnies...until the day DEATH came!" scene.

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Alternate dimensions cannot be used as a "It's a proof that I was right" without further evidence determining the motivations of each party involved.
In an alternate dimesion Tielekku could have been different (and judging the magic as harmless or willingly stepping down and dying or what ever), or Ermeeth could have been differently motivated and teaching the Oranbegans magic for enlightenement (or something like that) and not "to displace the gods" kind.

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What reason is there to assume any of that? We're pretty much told that the place where Peaceful Oranbega diverged was when they won the war with Mu without resorting to demonic help. There's no support for the assertion that Ermeeth and Tielekku had completely different personalities in the alternate universe, and there's no reason to assume that when the hypothesis "Oranbega winning the war caused the changes" is consistent with the description of Ermeeth we just got from Azuria and explains the differences quite nicely. Postulating all these other changes when the given explanation suffices is ignoring Occam's Razor.

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When push comes to shove the facts we have is that when the Oranbegans were pushed they turned to dark powers that corrupted them. If that "Push" hadn't been the Mu it could have been something completely different. Say, the Rikti? Or the Rularuu? Or any other kind of lethal monstrosity that the Oranbegans were unable to fight "straigh up". Not very enlightened at all. "Spitting in the face of your killer" is something villains do. The oranbegans of our dimension released their magic A-bomb, and the demonic pollution is still here. Even if you're defeated the consequences are too harsh.

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They made a bad choice and fell, therefore their civilization and its founder must have always been evil? I don't think that follows. Civilizations diverge from the purposes for which they were founded all the time.

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As for "the mu has magic! Self-defeating!". Who says the Mu learned the SAME kind of magic as Ermeeth was teaching the Oranbegans in our dimension? Maybe the Mu learned a different type of magic (the not-leading-to-challenging-the-gods type of magic).

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You're postulating the existence of unnecessary entities again. What evidence do we have that there are two completely different brands of magic, one "good" and one "bad"? Or that Ermeeth was trying to teach the bad one?

The only evidence we have that Ermeeth was doing anything bad is that Tielekku was trying to stop him, and we think Tielekku was good. All of these attempts to place blame on Ermeeth for his followers making one bad choice (when faced with utter annihilation at the hands of Tielekku and Hequat) are only trying to help Tielekku save face.

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For one thing, judging from the text on Magic enhancements our powers come through the gods and not entirely indepent from them.

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If they make the claim that all magic in the world of Paragon is drawn from the gods, I'm quitting the same day. I'm not a [censored] cleric, I'm a wizard, and I refuse to have my character relying on anyone else for power. The fact that the dimensional entities can assist in magic doesn't mean they're the sole source of it (and, if that were the case, it would be rather odd that powers function at all without SOs, and better when slotted with Hamidon-bits, Crystal Titan gems, or Hydra pieces instead of dimensional entity help).

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A ) Power does not equal enlightenement.
The Oranbegans were seeking power. Did they seek enlightenment and the wisdom to guide that power.
Apparantly not, after all they did summon demons and became the CoT, hardly the actions of an enlightened culture.

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And, in an alternate universe, they became the Peaceful Oranbegans, who went on to rule wisely for several millenia in a virtual utopia (civilization-wise; their architecture still needs a bit of shoring-up.)

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B ) Handing the power of the gods to mortals is....well, pretty much like handing an A-bomb to every guy in the neighbourhood.

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Who says these were A-bomb-sized magical powers? The millions of magical descendants of Mu that have power today don't seem to be in danger of destroying the planet.

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To sum it up, Tielekku is IMHO a benevolent diety.
Ermeeth, while maybe (but not necessarily) having benevolent intentions was essentially misguided and had to be stopped, for the good of the gods and for mankind.

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The peaceful Oranbegan world puts the lie to this. The Oranbegans of our world only became the CoT because of the war with Mu. If Tielekku and Hequat had left Ermeeth alone...well, we might not have gotten the "all violence is abhorrent!" Oranbegans, but we certainly wouldn't have gotten the "Demons are good, let's eat your soul!" ones that we have today.

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In one thing Tielekku (or Hequat) succeded. Magicians today might be powerful, but they're nowhere near godlike (which was probably Ermeeth intention).
And while the gods are not present they're not per se displaced (no one has taken their place, yet) nor dead.

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The magicians today don't seem much different from the Peaceful Oranbegans. I don't see anything to support your assertion that Ermeeth was trying to teach them some magic more powerful than what we currently have, except that it's required to support your argument that Tielekku was doing the right thing.

Wow. Arguing theology about an imaginary religion.

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I wouldn't say that- but the Mu bloodlines have survived and spread far and wide. Destroying Mu didn't destroy the Muvians- it just spread their unique traits into humanity as a whole. The inscription is a statement of defiance- "You can destroy our city, but never our people and what they stand for."

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Actually, given that they stood for the idea that mortals shouldn't have magic, I'd say it got destroyed pretty effectively.

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Oh I don't think they're saying that specifically. I think they're saying more along the lines of people who work for MAGI etc. are the descendants of what we've been discussing. But the story I believe is still intended to be flexible enough that you can have your own dang histories, origins, family trees etc. Without having to be a descendant of something.

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I don't know.

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Nearly every magical hero, seer, mystic, wizard, witch, sorcerer, medium, and channel is one.

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They seem to be pushing it pretty hard. Yes, it's "nearly every", not "every", but it's still rather restrictive. It's like if they had another Rikti War event, and said that "nearly every" hero died in it. There's room to explain why your hero is an exception, but explaining away exceptions like that is an ugly kludge.

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The blood of Mu is very simply explained.

It is the descendants of the Great Diaspora. Indeed, it has washed over the oceans and the lands, and their bloodlines have spread across the world, a gift for the arcane and the mystic that has created an army of the supernaturally aware who battle against that which is hidden in the darkness and hungers for man in his ignorance and tranquility.

Pretty darn cool, all things considered.

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Actually, I'm not sure I like the idea that every non-CoT, non-BP magic user has to be a descendant of Mu. Seems a little too much like midichlorians. I'd like to be able to have a character who, say, learned magic through years of careful study, without having the Story Team come in and say "No, it's really because your great-great-great^10-grandfather came from this lost civilization."

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The current Mu are the same. They are the descendants of the Mu civilization that tried to keep magic from humanity, but are now fighting for humanity. The descendents for the most part likely do not have any loyalties or motivations to keep magic from humanity, they have their own agendas and loyalties.

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Boy, Hequat's not likely to be happy about that if she ever comes back. (And wasn't the Envoy hinting at something along those lines...?)

Neither is Tielekku, come to think of it. How happy is she going to be when she gets paged for help from those magic-using mortals she was trying to prevent?

For that matter, if the Envoy wasn't just making up threats about Hequat coming back to convince the CoT to deal with him (and this is looking more likely if the Coven is a Hequat-led Mu group), could Tielekku have sent Hequat back after receiving the page in the Scroll arc?

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I could see getting a bit bitter after existing as a ghost in a buried city for a few thousand years but how did the racially bred people of Mu, the empire founded to keep magic empowerment from Humans, turn good?

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And, in the process, became the source for the magic empowerment of most of humanity. Fun, isn't it?

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She's also been implicated in a sort of genetic breeding experiment, wherein she continually refined the strain of humanity she had serving her to such a powerful point that they were well-nigh unstoppable.

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Hmm...I don't remember that one. Was that in the Envoy of Shadows arc?

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However, what IS certain is that Azuria is being deliberately deceptive, or is very, very ignorant of Oranbega's perspective, which she has no excuse to be, since she has the Oranbega summoning premeir as a semi-permanent guest.

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I think the "timeline" as far as missions and story arcs go is rather flexible, since it has to account for heroes running the missions at different times. We all know Nemesis is around, and by the end of our careers, so do our contacts, but the contacts are still always going to have the "Could Nemesis really still be out there?" reaction during the first few Nemesis missions on any hero. The interview with Azuria could be from before Akarist arrived, on the assumption that most heroes haven't gotten there yet.

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No. The deal wasn't to keep magic from humans, it was to keep the gods from being displaced by magic-wielding mortals (who probably wouldn't be mortal after their aquirement of incredibly vast powers), and they're definitly not displaced, so Hequats mission succeeded.

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They look more or less replaced to me. Tielekku's gone, Hequat's gone, Ermeeth's gone, the "dimensional entities" are pretty much non-present...nobody's worshipping anyone in Paragon that I see except the Banished Pantheon (who are currently being fought by us mortals, not by gods). The only gods that actually show up are evil (except Faathim, but he's from another dimension). I think a good case could be made that yes, the gods have been replaced in Paragon City, although technology and scientific progress had as much to do with it as magic-wielders. There's no need to call on a god for protection when you can just call up your Tanker buddy.

I note the story's a bit different from Mu's perspective. The way Akarist told it, Hequat was more or less a total nutjob trying to kill the Oranbegans because she was Ermeeth's ex. I don't recall seeing a link between Tielekku, Hequat, and Ermeeth before, but the "You gave the humans magic? You must die!" thing sort of puts Tielekku in a much worse light than she seemed after the Scroll arc.

I do find it mildly ironic (and somewhat irrational, which makes me lean more towards Akarist's interpretation of Hequat) that in order to destroy the civilization that Ermeeth taught magic to, Hequat taught magic to another civilization that wound up becoming the source for all the people who know magic today. Yep, that worked out real well for keeping magic from the humans.

I wonder if that Jet Li guy is Kublai?

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... I thought Scirrocco was one of the Surviving X (where X is a number between one and twenty )? I assume he's the katana scrapper... but man, how'd Lord Recluse turn him evil?

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There's an exploration badge that goes something like "This is where one of the brave souls to take up the mantle of Scirrocco stood, and fell, to the Rikti invaders."

And a hero named Scirrocco used to be Serafina's master, and died in the Rikti invasion.

And, unless my ears deceived me, Statesman and crew said they were pulling that raid in order to retrieve "Serafina's Crystal"....

Also, I believe, per one of Manticore's "Web of Arachnos"-shilling replies, Scirrocco is somehow connected with the Cape of the Four Winds.

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Hmm...

GenericDev001
GenericHero8237
DevWithoutCoolHandle

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"Another Programmer"