Erydanus

Wow, having a Jay interview would be pretty cool. Does this mean you're Rednaming him?

Well my point is, your guide is not as useful as it could have been. It doesn't reflect what actually works, even with disclaimers that they may change sometime. (Though you DID make a comment like that about Lysosomes and Parry, so right there you're not being consistent with it.)

My impression from what the devs have said is changing those results is pretty impossible without recoding the whole engine so I don't think it's a bug in the usual sense of having an expectation to change soon. There are a few things in there that folks might not think of - for instance Microfilament in Swift boosting both Run and Fly speed - but beyond that, most things are pretty straightforward. I appreciate you put a lot of work into this, but I think it could be better.

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Wow, man....you need to drink a beer or something. I wasnt trying to come at this with a scientific method or anything, it was only my personal opinion about it. I try to leave the hard numbers to the math guru's on these forums. I realy dont have the time to waste trying to get hard core numbers. Its only an observation open for discussion.

Dont get me wrong, my opnion of the matter still stands, but dont think im here trying to prove any hard numbers, because I am not. On another note, there was some slight giggling when I wrote this, so dont go taking me too seriously.

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This is the GUIDE section of the board. This is the place for serious posts with hard numbers. If you want to say you don't like this power and discuss its shortcomings, there are other places for it such as the Archetypes and Powers General Discussion, or in one of the various official threads dealing with veteran rewards.

In answer to some of the original confusion, the Veteran power is named Ghost Slaying Axe; the original temp power is Undead Slaying Axe. The text referring to them is inconsistent in several places, though.

Good reference, but I thought ... aren't HOs bugged/coded in such a way that tohit/def buff enhancers and tohit/def debuff enhancers are interchangeable? So that, for instance, you can put a Cytoskeleton into Radiation Infection on the basis of it taking endurance reducers and then the "buff" effect actually enhances the debuffs of the powers? Or did that get fixed? Or did I get that whole thing wrong?

I tested it a few months ago with a cooperative friend and did not observe any secondary damage numbers on Fallout. After discussing this in various places, I was told it was a quasi-pet. Looking at the City of Data site, it's listed as a pet power.

I thought Fallout worked through a Quasi-pet nd was NOT containable.

Hm, the Tsoo should take the place of the 10 Lords a'leaping and be "Ten Sorcs a'porting" ... and you guys forgot another really annoying group; hmm... try this on:

12 Wolves a'roaring
11 Mages casting
10 Sorcs a'porting
9 Knives a'flingling
8 Mushrooms mezzing
7 Sappers sapping
6 Morts a'rezzing
5 Super...Arachnos
4 Master Illusionists
3 Spectral Lords
2 Rularu
and a Hami in a Devouring Earth tree

; )

Can we use a direct IP address for your site?

I really like Torrent, and I think it's underrated in this guide. You see, someone clued me in on an element of the game: mobs which are resistant to immobilizes are weak to knockback (and vice-versa!) So basically, top-heavy mobs that can't be immobilized easily like Warwolves are completely at the mercy of this power. One blast of Torrent and red Totems go flying. I love it, it's a great way to juggle those big, pesky mobs that Tentacles don't work well on. It's absolutely true you don't want to use it all the time but judiciously used it's great for compacting foes into the area of effect of more of your powers.

The benefit from slotting Swift is pretty trivial. Swift alone is like an extra SO in hover; but 3-slotting it doesn't make it worth 2. I'd 1 slot Swift but 3-slot Hover.

Hover is getting a 10% speed boost in I8.

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The train points you to the mythical spirit world. The map does too.

[/ QUOTE ] It does, actually; the entire region as a whole is Croatoa (think of it as the entire county or township); the city of Salamanca is within it and is pretty small - just the one strip of buildings.

A nice guide, but you are using the wrong terminology for hold magnitude. The #s you are using are the resistance levels of minions, lts, and bosses (1, 2, and 3). Hold powers must exceed those values to work. Therefore, a standard single target hold is actually mag 3, and will affect a lt (3>2) in one application. Ergo, Choking Cloud actually has a chance of a mag 2 or a mag 3 hold - if both happen to hit it adds to mag 5. Mag 4 or higher holds a boss. Likewise, EMP would thus be usually Mag 3 with a chance of Mag 4.

It's probably not a big deal to defenders unless they're desperately trying to stack those two powers, but any controller with radiation secondary who reads this guide is going to think these powers are weaker than they really are. The mag ratings continue up to really big numbers (off the top of my head I want to say holding an AV takes a 24 magnitude) so knowing the true power of each hold is pretty important.

Here, this might help: The guide to understanding magnitude

I just want to point out that this guide originated before controllers had containment, and before area holds & pets were decreased in power to make the overall experience smoother across all levels. Take all the early posts with a grain of sand. I, for one, have a level 42 Gravity/Radiation controller and it's been easy to solo him anytime I've wanted to. ANY good controller build will be much more soloable today than it was in 2004.

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Tell me he was at LEAST a stone tanker. Please tell me that. Any other tanker trying to tank a psionic damage AV is just... idiotic.

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I believe he was invulnerability. He was a good tanker in other missions I had run with him, he apparently just had his hands over his ears when I suggested my pet take the alpha. Twice. On two separate occasions. Sometimes people will just not listen.

Now, to the person above who commented that some of this is a "leadership" issue, I do agree in part. A good leader is always going to maximize the team. The thing is, I think the original poster's goal was to just get at the very route of a perceptual/assumption problem and bring it to light. That's not so much of a leadership issue as a "good player knowledge" issue. It really is a truism that a lot of people get stuck in the Hollows and learn some bad play techniques. I personally think that Frostfire should be a 2 hour timed mission just so that it can't be farmed as extensively as it is.

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Great idea - as others have mentioned there are some fantastic synergies between Mind and Kin (although Mind can launch controls from range it by no means has to remain at range - in fact it is one of the safest primaries to be in melee with).

Also, I'd point out some of the really nice synergy between Fire and Sonic - the debuff anchor on the melee pets, the +Res shields for the normally squishy pets, and the overall damage increase from the two debuffs. Plus an additional AoE location control (that you point out Fire is lacking) is sitting right there at Tier 9 in Liquefy.

But yeah, excellent idea and nice work

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A lot of that applies to Illusion as well. You can put the team-anchored sonic debuff on the Phantom Army, and sonic provides a couple nice complements to Illusion.

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Unfortuantely whenever I try to milk MIs I get people coming by to steal both the pets and/or the MI.

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I believe as long as you do SOME damage to them you get kill credit. So plink them and let the wanna-be killstealer do the work for you.

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Honestly do you really think a trick arrow defender is going to be saving more people from the carnies, cot, arachnos, and devouring earth mobs than an empath or thermals will? Empathy/Thermals is the catch all net when it comes to these given situations, nothing short of getting 1 shotted is going to kill you with these powersets if that healer is doing their job.

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I think you totally fail to get the point. There are other options. You may have to adjust your playstyle to take advantage of them. That includes pulling sometimes to diminish spawns to a more manageable size, carrying break frees, having a pet take an alpha strike, or whatever. As the original poster said, it's the Diablo2 paradigm: mitigate damage in whatever way you can. You remind me of a tank I played with recently when I was on my Grav controller. We did the Psychic Clockwork King mission twice and both times he insisted on taking the Alpha and died, despite me saying I could spawn my pet on the king to take it. (I tried soloing the PCK actually; I didn't succeed but my pet tanked him for 3 minutes.)

I think this is a great commentary post. I think discussion about this outdated paradigm needs to happen. Here's one of my experiences.

During the test of Recluse's Victory I got to build a 40th level version of my Illusion Controller. My Illusion/Empathy controller. Now, the real version of that character is someone I play with friends and I do split myself 50/50 between the power sets. However, if I weren't, I'd really like to focus on Illusion. So, for Recluse's Victory testing, I built a version which did that and only took Empathy powers that I could apply to myself or my several pets and thus skipped 2 of the 3 heals and the rez power. I ended up in a small group of 4 or 5. I buffed normally, except that single-target buffs went onto my Phantasm first, and then whoever I could get them onto. Under the cloak of Superior Invis, I ran behind the tank and scrapper and used my heal aura on them some as well, but not lots as they were wading through area attacks.

Then someone realized I didn't have direct target heals, or the rez. This person then started foaming at the mouth and practically screaming about it. It was, in fact, another defender if I remember correctly, an Offender at that. "You don't have rez? HOW CAN YOU CALL YOURSELF AN EMPATH!?!" My answer was, "I don't; I'm an Illusion Controller. I can empathically buff my pets, and sometimes the team as well. My priority is to Blind or Deceive that lieutanant so he's not hitting you in the first place."

Nobody else on the team had a problem with my build. They got all the buff auras. But this one person just kept going off like a crazy person. And that attitude is a problem for the game.

We absolutely need to have a going away party. How about in Pocket D on the test server on some convenient evening while she's still with us? September 1, unfortunately IS a Friday. How about Sunday, August 27 at 9 Eastern/8 Central/7 Pacific?

Up for it Cuppa?

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No I think you're not understanding: You are still comparing doing something for someone else (regardless of reward) vs doing something for yourself (regardless of reward)!


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No, I'm not. I'm saying, "What I am getting out of this is the satisfaction of doing the good deed and getting some exercise." I am saying, what I am getting FROM MYSELF for myself is 'X.' That the neighbor surprised me with something else is just a bonus; I did it for 'X.' That's what I'm making my decision on, and what I think you should make it on. In your example, you're effectively saying, "Shoveling my own sidewalk so I don't slip on it isn't good enough; I need to know I'm getting the neighborhood association award for most promptly-cleared walk to make it worthwhile."

Consider this: A lot of people are getting Toothbreaker now by running other people's lower level missions. Those people are filling up their contact bar with DJ Zero. What if, after this event ends, those people who filled up their DJ Zero contact bar get something else, such as one or more additional missions which are play content, or maybe even facilitate or unlock another badge? Would you be upset you weren't notified there was something in it for you if you got him as a full contact? I say, you have the opportunity now; if you choose not to use it, well, you make your choice knowing what everyone else does: nothing.

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PvP zone badges seem to be working fine following the guidelines Posi himself posted at the beginning of this thread.


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Uhoh.

I have Risk Taker AND Forward Observer on one of my characters. He got Forward Observer for completing the basic patrol of Bloody Bay on the first day of Issue 6. He has the hyper-stealth temp power from it. Recently, since this thread clued me in I didn't get the right badge, I re-ran the patrol and got... Risk Taker. He also got some XP. I'm quite sure there was no PVP involved (other than trying to solo the meteor mission and not pulling it off due to the turrets regenerating too fast) as it was before anyone but the head-start people were playing and nobody from CoV could get in. In fact, I had to come back a day or two later to talk to the longbow rep stationed in Skyway because the initial direction was to come right into the zone and talk to Agent Eckman.

I ran another character (level 23 or 24) through the patrol and he also got the Risk-taker badge, hyperstealth power, and xp.

Then I ran a couple 16-18th level characters through. Risk Taker, Hyper Stealth, NO XP. Do I need to bug or petition this or anything? Or is this enough info in the right ear?

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Except his analogy still fails.

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I think that you're not understanding it. I am, in fact, thinking that this hypothetical neighbor rewards you with $20 after you dig out her driveway (or maybe bakes you a batch of cookies). Now, I look at this situation and say, "What I am getting out of this is the satisfaction of doing the good deed and getting some exercise." If that's enough, so be it, if not, then don't do it. The Toymaker badge, the present drops, the temporary powers, and the satisfaction of actually doing a couple-hours grind to get a rare badge that most people blew off is the equivalent to the self-satisfaction of shoveling the driveay.

But oh! Look, after I shoveled the driveway out I got HOMEMADE COOKIES! Yum! Bonus! (maybe it was right after I dug it out, maybe it was weeks later when she started baking.) And in this case we have "oh hey we unbugged the snowbeast gladiator minion and you'll be getting one with your toymaker badge." It's the nice bonus surprise, not something promised up front or contracted for.

I maintain, you should make the decision based on what you know, and shouldn't reconsider it with 20/20 hindsight.

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Just me:

Never invite someone who says "no blind invites",

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Kick anyone from the group whose first, kneejerk question is "what level are you guys." particularly if he's below the group's average level. he's assuming that the team leader is an idiot inviting people 5 or more levels higher than he is.

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1. It's been covered a lot already but let me explain for you since you've already gotten to 50 and lapped around to mid levels again. A lot of new players these days are camping in the hollows from as early as they can until level 19-20. Yes, that long. Mostly, they re-run Frostfire on Invincible at level 15 but occasionally they have a few more arc missions after that. (Honestly, I think FF should be a timed mission that you can fail and move on from. It's severely abused now. I would miss the snow ramp fun but I could live without). Anyway, without a chance to say, "Are you running a level 15 invincible frostfire mish?" "Yes!" "Not interested" life would not have been so good for several of my toons. Anyway, despite having a "Please send tell first, soloing" message up, I usually get blind invites that get repeated at me 5x. I'm serious here.

2. I think the kicking thing is a bad knee-jerk reaction. If someone's not in the team's zone and they're being asked to go somewhere they don't usually (higher or lower than they expect) they could just be checking to see if they need to SK, in fact, getting to the team might be an issue for them especially if they're pre-travel power. Maybe they just want to do the math and make sure they're going to get XP. (I was on a mission once and the lowest level guy was outside the range for getting xp, but somehow the team was composed in such a way no one could SK him.)

On to new stuff!!

Do not ...

...yell LFT without setting your search flag. I'm sure Atlas Park doesn't care you're looking but the people of your level over in Talos might be interested. Then again, maybe you shouldn't. ~_^

... ignore your team leader's instructions. If the team leader is actually laying down a plan - any real plan- go with it even if you don't like it. Or give a suggestion. Don't just ignore it and do your own thing. Especially don't tell the team to GO! when one person asked. Maybe the team leader is typing, "The defender sent me a tell, he's AFK" or maybe he's about to say "wait a few seconds my group hold/ recovery aura / Hasten / etc. is almost back up". Just announce you're ready and wait for the leader's signal.

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I'm not asking for Toy Collector. I made a decision not to spend hours acquiring a badge. However, it now appears that was An Uninformed Decision (TM) with regards to this Gladiator. And I agree completely with Statesman, those types of decisions are bad.

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I understand where you're coming from, but I don't agree with you. The point of opening 200 presents was to get the Toy Collector badge. As part of that process, there were some temp powers you might get, and present inspirations. (On one of my two characters who got the badge, I didn't even get both temp powers and considered opening additional presents until he did.) So there WAS content beyond simply getting a title. That is all that anyone had to base their decision on. Please keep in mind that Gladiator is a system that is still somewhat new. Additional badges are being added still, some to old and common badges; the most recent example of this is the Kaolin Legacy of Earth which is linked to the Collector badge. It DID in fact occur to me that at some point in time they might link a winter minion gladiator badge to Toy Collector. I did not make my decision to get Toy Collector based on that. I made my decision because I wanted the title.

Frankly, a lot of people whined about Toy Collector being so tedious to get. In the end, it really was something very challenging for a badge hunter to solo, and I am quite proud of having it on two characters. That we are now going to get a gladiator for it is a very nice surprise that I appreciate. The grousing I am hearing about it from others though reminds me of people who say things like, "If I'd known I would have gotten something out of it, I'd have shoveled my elderly neighbor's driveway for her." Sometimes you should not make decisions about what you think you might out of them, just about whether its worth doing something for its own sake.

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You wouldn't, but Poz and I would. We are of the opinion that there are too many tabs there as it is.

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I agree with you, it's kind of busy. I boggled when Gladiator went in, but those are genuinely different. I wouldn't mind if achievement and accomplishment were combined; they're both badges you get for "doing something" as opposed to "going somewhere." Exploration is probably the biggest and easiest category already, so a tab of its own makes sense. History could combine with it because it is a sort of sub-type of exploration, except, exploration is really huge and both it and history have growth potential. Accolades works well enough as a semi-catchall for events/perks/collections. But, I don't see much distinction between killing a # of a mob or winning 1 specific mission, story arc, or task force. (Actually I could see moving TF/Trial badges to accolades. They are honors lauded on you by signature heroes or for exceptional actions.)

Thanks for an excellent guide. I really like how you've thoughtfully explained the principles of the archetype and then given specific detailing on the powersets. So much better than simple cookie-cutter guides (though some of those that get into real specifics with strategy can be quite good, too).

I am working on an ice/ice blaster currently and this has really helped. I recently picked up the group immobilize and after I did so questioned my choice. Having played a controller before, my reflex was that immobilizes were all useful (for a controller, they are: they're sufficient to initiate containment) so I passed over an assault power. On the other hand, I was iffy on the ice sword powers so I think I will treat it like a blast and slot for damage.