Dispari

So coming full circle, the argument is that TA is fine when used in situations where you don't need support to begin with because it's already easy.

So you alone hold the key to TA being intensely amazing if played just the right way, but don't wish to share it because it's a secret which must be discovered personally. Gotcha.

This point is largely moot. The only thing TA has "strengths" over is when you compare it to nothing at all, because it's very weak compared to every other set. You even noted in your above quote that you never said TA was anywhere near as good as the other debuffing sets. You seem to be arguing that since TA can technically provide some level of support, that makes it okay. Even if it's vastly inferior to all other sets. Even if you play it really really well. You're arguing that TA can provide n level of support where n is a non-zero value, and that means it's just fine. Even if the value of n is fractional or microscopic.

You're telling us all about how TA has strengths that can be played to and how teams can fail to take advantage of those while simultaneously noting that you don't disagree that TA is weaker than the other sets. It's like you're arguing that a Tanker who only has Tough/Weave is still valid because he can technically maybe tank some of the time, and is maybe sort of better than not having a Tanker at all. But no, it's not the numbers that are bad, people just aren't using him right.

I do that too, but it depends on the level of involvement.

For APPs,there's no backstory. These are easy to apply to any toon.

For PPPs, there's a backstory, but you can ignore it for some. For instance, elec blasts from Mu Mastery just look like red elec. Fairly ambiguous.

The shields however have symbols associated with them which are always there. When you use your dark shield, you will always have Ghost Widow's icon pulsing in and out. I can however ignore this minor detail.

When using something like Mace Mastery, you are without a doubt using an Arachnos mace. You are also summoning arachnos robots with it. You can still wave this as stolen or "quite similar" tech.

So it will depend on the amount of "imprint" they put on things to see how flexible they make them for roleplay purposes.

Wouldn't make GameStop very happy when their "exclusive" promotion is given out in other ways.

Basically like the beginner's luck I figure. Good for low levels, but slowly tapers off and becomes more or less pointless at 20. It's not about giving people advantages (I doubt many people are angry that level 50s don't get beginner's luck), it's about helping out low levels. By 20 there are far better things, and your performance pre-20 isn't anything that can really be unbalanced by such an object.

As one of the "veterans" you mentioned here, I'm totally okay with this system.

At first I was annoyed, seeing that you get bonuses for the pre-order that I can't get. I already bought Going Rogue. Plus, I never liked GameStops "preorder and get EXCLUSIVES" promotions. I don't like the commercials boasting that if you order the game through them you get advantages other people don't. And as a "loyal" customer who bought it as soon as it went on sale, I miss out. Granted, I'm enjoying my level 45 DP/Dark and 34 DS/Thermal...

However, I looked over the site and saw they're only about as strong as a dual-enhancement IO of level 20. Meaning by the time you're in your 30s there are way better things. They did have a proc component, but that much I wasn't worried about. At this point they were just "slightly better procs."

Now that I hear the proc turns off at 21+, that means these are just low-level tools for new players to have a bit of an edge. Devs have taken a lot of steps to ease the 1-20 levels and get people into the game, and this is a pretty decent attempt. I don't mind not having stuff for low levels, since as a vet I tend to blast through that stuff as fast as possible anyway (hello Stamina).

So I'm all for new stuff and "advantages" for new players and low-level toons. Those of us who have been playing a while don't need these sorts of perks necessarily. As long as they don't start bleeding over into the majority of the game. Good call on this one.

I noticed this pretty early on when making some guys. I was noticing that my custom group was far too ST heavy. They had almost no AoEs at all, and it was making it extremely difficult for soloers but laughably simple for teams.

I tried mixing it up. Remove a power or two here to add an AoE. Add in Empty Clips or Ball Lightning where possible. But these powers were adding almost no experience. In most cases I couldn't remove any number of powers to add any number of AoEs. I had to simply add on top of my already 100% exp, making my enemies strictly harder, not situationally harder.

The guy who wrote the Xanth books? I remember reading those in grade school. I sent him a short story once.

I've mentioned numerous times I wish we had an extra pool of common powers to grab from. In the same way we can pick flight, it would be nice if there was an extra pool (a third set of powers if you will) that has random assorted ranged attacks. All the elemental blasts, Hurl and Hurl Boulder, shurikens, throwing knives, pistols, and any other random ranged powers.

Reason being, the powers given to the player for some melee sets just aren't always in-line. Not every martial artist throws shurikens, and forcing the player to take those powers can hamper creativity. Additionally, this could create a pool of powers that players can add to otherwise melee or defense oriented units (those being the hardest ones to get exp for) without having to abandon concept. For instance, a pretty standard unit type is SS/Inv; there are tons of these normally in the game, but actually making one of your own means having to make them obscenely strong. If there was a pool you could grab from and add an extra ranged attack or two, it could ease the pain.

Plus, I have an arc full of custom Trolls. I went out of my way to make sure some are melee/range (MA/AR for instance) so they'd have ranged attacks. But without sacrificing something their ranged options are severely limited. I'd happily add Hurl and/or Hurl Boulder as well as some pistol attacks and anything else to some of my units. Plus, I hate how my EM bosses shoot energy blasts and trolls with shurikens just seem silly.

Defense sets and melee sets are extremely bad about giving experience. In particular, if you have a boss with melee/defense, they have to be pretty much completely decked out to give 100% exp in the 50 range. I made several mixed enemies and my bosses have to have things like Knockout Blow to give full exp, and have nearly every toggle and auto in their defense set.

I was able to get away with a Lieutenant who only has two attacks (both ST whip moves from DS), an auto (Temperature Protection), and Fiery Embrace, who gave 100% exp. But any bosses I tried to make with Summon/Defense had to have at least 2 pet summons in addition to all three attacks, and have all toggles and autos, and still might not hit 100%. I made a Bots/Invuln who was unstoppably powerful and I eventually scrapped him because any balance I did to keep him at 100% made him far too strong.

Range/Defense! I want n00ks.

Also Melee/Buff so I can be Kin/Kin!

When DS launched my friend and I pacted and then took turns farming in RWZ with our BS/Shield toons who aren't even soft-capped. Running on +2/x6 we don't have any bosses except for mission objectives. One SC will kill an entire spawn save the 1-2 lieutenants, which are more than half dead. Just swing Headsplitter and Disembowel.

I admit I haven't played things like Spines/Fire but I kind of doubt any other set can kill a complete spawn of +2/x6 in three seconds flat.

I don't think I've spent even 1 billion on any of my toons. Even my fully IOed out widow probably wasn't that much. Other than her, I have an IOed out Elec/Invuln Brute who was pretty cheap, and two Shield toons who do fine without even needing to be soft-capped (they each have around 30% DEF), who I didn't spend much on. I guess I also have IO scraps on my Necro/Dark MM, but I'd be surprised if I even spent 100m on her.

The rest of my 26 toons just use standard IOs with a random IO scrap here or there.

Sounds like one-shot code or purple patch based on the hint. Can't possibly be that easy though can it?

I can vouch for about 20 people.

Someone reads Cracked.

Which is incidentally pretty much the only time I use oranges. Except for small oranges, because I always burn small inspirations whatever they are.

There's your problem. Seriously.

I always check people who have the "looking for team" flag first, after I check friends and SG. That may get me 1-2 people, or more if it's a good day and there's something going on (like DS just getting released). After that I send out a broadcast. That almost never gets me anything. After that I start asking people.

LFT flag and spamming broadcast are extremely ineffective ways of finding a team. If all you're doing to "find a team" is setting your LFT flag or spamming broadcast in one zone, it's no wonder it's not working.

Maybe a missed a power. Oh well.

tl;dr: Purples are generally superior to oranges in nearly all situations.

And then the next thing becomes FotM and the cycle repeats. Forever.

Though that's a poor excuse to say we should never balance things.

I've done this on Virtue, Freedom, Justice, Pinnacle, and Guardian.

But if you're sitting on a low pop server annoyed you aren't in a team of 8 at all times, you're probably on the wrong server. Some people like the low pop servers. It's like standing in a puddle annoyed there aren't enough whales. That's not what the puddle's for. It's so kids can make mud pies. I think I was going somewhere with this analogy.

I suppose you're talking an Elec Tank with Tough, since that's the only way you'd have 80% RES. So assuming all your RES stuff is fully slotted with level 50 IOs:

S/L: 79.2%
E: 90%
N: 35.8%
F/C: 35%
P: 55.55%
T: 0%

If you use a small orange, you end up with 89.2%. So for a 100 damage attack, you take 10.8 instead of 20.8. Which is almost half (-50% damage). Your E doesn't change at all, so that's -0% for E. For N/F/C you're taking 55 instead of 65. Which is about -16%.

A small purple would mean you take 25% less damage to S/L/E/N/F/C. Which, while it's less on the S/L, is better on everything else. Especially E, which gets no benefit from an orange at all. So unless you're fighting enemies that do only S/L damage (unlikely), adding a purple allows you to reduce all incoming damage by a flat 25%. Adding a purple allows you to reduce damage to energy, which an orange can't do.

Also, using a medium or large orange when you have that much RES is a huge waste. You're only one small orange away from being capped to 3 things, so if you do use an orange, anything after that should be a purple.

Now, baseline, a small purple is -25% all damage, and a small orange is -10% all damage. A large orange is -20% all damage. If you have extraordinary amounts of DEF or RES already, it is a good idea to play to your strength since both of them increase exponentially as you indicated. 80% -> 90% is half damage. I do use oranges on my Invuln Brute who has 70% S/L. But mostly because she already has 40-50% DEF when surrounded by enemies. But in most cases, a purple goes a lot farther than an orange.