Frosticus

fire blast

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is the blaster version of blazing aura larger than the melee version like L field?

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No. It also does less damage/tick than the AT mod of 1 would seem to indicate (compare it to the armored AT versions).

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That's too bad, I just had good visions of hotfeet+blazing aura doing very good (and large) aoe damage.

I'm sure Castle in his infinite wisdom has his reasons for the way blazing aura is for blasters.

See integrating pvp via the Mission architect makes sense to most people. It is one of those logical steps that most people realize would be a very good way to get more pvp happening and honestly have custom pvp maps done poorly in games like unreal or CS?

But then you have the people in charge of pvp in this game on an entirely different wave length. Not only did they close the door to this possibility with the i13 changes, they set off a couple sticks of dynamite to ensure the surrounding hillside buried it.

The REALLY crazy thing is that architect and pvp changes were supposed to be lumped into the same issue. It is like there is absolutely no communication going on between departments, but then you realize that many of the same people are in both departments and all you can do is shake your head.

How it never occured to them that MA could be just as useful to pvper's and one of the best ways to integrate pve into pvp is dumbfounding. Or they realized and just don't give a [censored].

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I have a totally seperate question... so if your a fire/cold its safe to assume that you will go Mako Patron (like I did on my electric/cold (I have a fire/cold too)) But I have been wondering is Summon Coralax pet any good to have around? I have never had it before but thinking of respecting into it to team with VS (for the electric/). How is the pet in PvP and PvE? Is it any good?

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I like the coralax pet. I haven't really pvp'd much since i13 so I can't speak to how good it is there.

All of his attacks cycle pretty quickly.

I like it more than the /mace spider (who honestly does nothing most of the time), but less than the /soul fortunata (she's pretty mean). I haven't tried the /mu pet for corrs.

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i'ld be happy if you could just select ANY of the maps available inside the MA and set it to an arena type mode.

Would make team pvp interesting on multi floor maps with lifts and actual jails.

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This.

Elevators/jails would be really awesome, but I could see jails getting exploited as in people sitting outside the door waiting for you. I don't really see how elevators couldn't be really cool. If things like this started happening, it might just get everyones mind off of the whole you know what situation.

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I'll be waiting for you when you come out of the elevator with my Flak Cannon.

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is the blaster version of blazing aura larger than the melee version like L field?

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How much damage did the attacks do at lvl 1, 5, 10, 15 before? (ie iceblast, bolt, sword, ISC, hold, immob)
How much damage do they do now at lvl 1, 5, 10, 15?

The answer is the first clue.

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Unless your team is already dropping the groups in a matter of seconds the best time to nuke is when it, aim and buildup are all recharged and there is 10-16 enemies in the area.

So for me that is about every 110 seconds.

Since you are allowed to combine inspirations there is no reason to ever have your damage halt or even decrease after nuking.

Some of them work better once someone has taken initial agro, some of them can be used with less risk. Psy wail is one of the better ones for that.

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Just to clarify a few things here:

Snow Storm can still be useful in the late game, even though it might not be used as regularly as other powers. Sure, the slow effect is cool, but since it's a target toggle, I really only make use of it if there's a single tough mob, like an EB or AV, or even one of the stronger Bosses.

Snow Storm also has a -Fly component, which is useful for grounding most flying mobs. I used it against some flying CoT Air Casters that were clustered together and trying to attack me. I hit Snow Storm on one of them and they all dropped like rocks through the hole in the floor (of course, this was in a situation where there was no aggro management and I had to pull whatever tricks I had).

Secondly, there are a few mobs that can escape Sleet. Not many, but there are a few, like Warwolves and Slag Beasts, and they can't even be stopped by Snow Storm. In such cases, I just hope that I can blast faster than they can attack.

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You describe prolonged fights, which I agree it is very solid in.

The lack of -fly is a weakness in my current build for sure. One I used to fill with web envelope, but I'm no longer a /mace build. It generally isn't a devastating weakness though to me or my team, so I can usually accept it.

IME the mobs that can escape sleet+rain of fire+fireball are the same mobs that can escape sleet+SS+rain of fire+fireball, except now I have a toggle debuff to keep an eye on running around and quite possibly agroing everything in the vicinity on to me.

Don't get me wrong, SS is a fine power, I just find that as the game goes on and on I use it less and less for both cold and storm. For my fire/storm troller and my fire/cold corr it just worked out that I dropped the power from my final builds. I still have it on my cold/dark and my storm/sonic though, but both are more defensively focused, where the two fire toons are offensive beasts.

There is no place on the internet for more than one person to be right!

Review it again I say.

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Pros:
- good single target damage
- all of the yummy rad debuffing goodness
- multiple holds for stacking or taking out multiple problem mobs
- everything in your secondary is an AoE except the rez, meaning less time spent using it
- best nuke in the game

Cons:
- endurance hungry, both primary and secondary
- lower sustained AoE than most other sets
- lolIceBlast in PvP
- in general teammates tend to see "anchor" and think "target!"


It's pretty straightforward and honestly you can get by solo on Relentless with just your single target blasts, Freeze Ray, and Accelerate Metabolism. At low levels Radiation Infection is great but at higher level/difficulty it's almost a waste of time unless you're toggle-herding.

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This. Except bitter freeze ray is kinda lame. It does what the label says, but it feels meh to me.

In addition to AM I add EF and then just blast away.

In most teams EF+LR is time better spent than casting RI, it's still a good power but ya I agree with Siolfir, it is generally not worth casting solo, or teamed.

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I was the guy saying: "pvp recipes, for pvp'ers, earned by pvp'ing and used for pvp"

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You know what..these suggestions I do agree with or untradeable PvP merits of some kind.

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I do agree though, hardcore pvp'ers pvp because they love it. That's why I did it across numerous games now, but I'm not so naive that I believe there is enough of that mentality here to have a healthy pvp system.

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This is where I have the biggest problem. PvP is still going to suck even if there's an influx of PvErs in the zone. Just having a mass of bodies won't help PvP at all. PvP is only fun with actual PvPers under a decent game mechanic. It's quality, not quantity.

But this point is even entirely moot, as new people didn't show up in RV to try their hands at getting one when they just bought it from WW (before the nerf bat). So, there's no quality..and no quantity.

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Pvp rewards (in whatever form they take in this game and most) are never intended to "fix" pvp. They are intended to be incentive and reward pvp activity. Nothing more.

No one in their right mind would come to the table and say "I've got it, I can get us to be the number 1 pvp game on the planet.... through loot!" (my personal feelings of Castle aside, even I don't think he'd say that)

Pvp rewards (character progression if you will) is designed to promote parity between game systems. The ultimate desire is NOT to segregate your user base into pve'ers and pvp'ers and have them practically loathe each other. The goal is for many players to find both systems equally worthy of their time and interest.

This is why some games actually allow you to level up through pvp activity. Why shouldn't I be able to progress through pvp? Why should I only pvp for the love of pvp, while my character remains completely static in a genre designed around the principle of character progression?

If all my loot tables are full after two hours of pve why shouldn't I be able to do something similar through active pvp involvement*

*Yes, I'm about to speak blasphemy; the fear of defeat needs to be greatly reduced in this game, so unlike the pve system, I believe pvp rewards should have a chance to be earned even through defeat (though not as high as through victory).

Regardless of how you believe hardcore pvp'ers are, a true hardcore pvp'er in this game would be knocking down the door at PS to get more pvp rewards implemented because they want to spend less time feeling inclined to pve (including the market). They just want to pvp, they want to be able to progress their character via pvp, not sit in pve to do it.

I think it is you who "lacks the will of the warrior"

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The fact that you even use snowstorm in late game on part of these "uber" builds/teams you play with is pretty telling. But that is neither here nor there.

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I think it says a lot when you think a -50% recharge AoE is useless in the end game.

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Did I say the numbers on it were useless? It is a good power, in prolonged fights. But if you are playing with hp capped toons that neither have use for FW, or because you are so awesome they don't need aidother either, then why would they need Snowstorm?

It would seem these uber builds and expert players you roll with would just cream everything in sight and they are so survivable they wouldn't need to ensure the npc's original attacks don't cycle again because:
a/ they are so survivable and
b/ uber builds kill so fast

The only time mobs would be standing long enough would be against exceptionally meaty targets, those targets reduce snowstorm to 7.5% -rech.

Maybe you wouldn't need to spend valuable in combat time utilizing the mitigation it offers if you prebuffed people to be more survivable?

In the time it takes you to use sleet+SS+icestorm my fire/cold has done sleet+rain of fire+fireball+blaze. If the team has any additional aoe output every minion is dead, the luts are in scourge range and so is the boss I just hit with blaze.

Different strokes for different folks I suppose, but the way you have presented yourself you play /cold like a defender would and have some weird fetish with it being a Molly Medic while in combat.

We definitely differ. The fire/cold build I posted for the OP doesn't even have Snow Storm in the final build. But I've already said I play fire/cold to it's strengths. I prebuff and I destroy. SS is redundant in late game (for me) because there is almost nothing I can't kill before the additional -recharge would pay off. So all it would do is extend the fight for the exact same outcome and the same incoming damage, just take longer.

Nothing escapes sleet, nothing lives long enough to cycle attacks again, why would I cast SS?

However, if you aren't making your allies nearly as survivable as you could and you believe your role while fighting is to nurse allies then ya, I guess SnowStorm is definitely worth casting.

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NRG is good for ST, but it certainly isn't better than Elec (though the gap is closer now). Build Up is the big difference, IMO.

Between Fire and Elec, I'd say Fire for Ranged and Elec for melee. With NRG coming up close in both categories.

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hmm not sure how I feel about elec.

Lbolt = E bolt
Lblast < Eblast
charged brawl ~= Powerpush
Havoc = Bonesmasher
Thunderstike < Power burst (check it out they do the same damage, but PB is way faster, ranged, costs less end and recharges faster)
? = total focus

VS is really needed, but I don't see that many /elecs with it (could just be me though).

If we pretend we have very little recharge
In a ~10 sec burst /elec would use:
bu>charged>havoc>Lblast>Lbolt>charg ed>thunder
=1435 damage

In a ~10 sec burst /nrg would use:
PP>blast>bone>burst>PP>TF
=1472

/nrg pulls way ahead in sustained. However LS just keps plugging away and we'd need to agree upon an accepted expected value for it.

But really /elec needs buildup just to compete. It's almost like /nrg gets powerboost from free

*I realize I made a lot of assumptions in the above comparison, but bare in mind each set used 6 attacks AND /elec got to use build up (so 7 moves). But they both ran about the same time.

So I guess my question to you is:
If hardcore pvp’ers pvp for intrinsic reasons, then why create a reward system that only they (and farmers) benefit from?

Wouldn’t it make more sense to create a system that has the potential to convert curious/non-hardcores into true pvp’ers, while ALSO rewarding existing pvp’ers (hardcore or w/e)?

I think this is honestly the first time anyone has referred to me as a pve'er.

I guess I can't complain, I really haven't been pvp'ing much since i13. It's not that I can't still do well, it just isn't very fun for me. It fails to intrinsically motivate me and the way the current drops are I'm not extrinsically motivated either.

I do agree though, hardcore pvp'ers pvp because they love it. That's why I did it across numerous games now, but I'm not so naive that I believe there is enough of that mentality here to have a healthy pvp system.

You must be new around here (I was ignoring reg date) because pvp rewards has been a LONG standing request from the active pvp crowd (most of which left in i13). They might be put in place to lure pve’ers in and convert them to pvp’ers (we all had to pve at some point before we could even enter a pvp zone, unless all you do is lvl 1 arena, hey repel ball was hella fun). Or they might be put in place to.. you know.. reward pvp. I believe they went for two birds with one stone, but have failed.

When they revamped pvp to be more newb friendly and then advertised pvp rewards, but then make the rewards only achievable for hardcore players (or farming) I just don't see how anyone can add 1+1+1 and get the answer you keep trying to push.

I do find it ironic being told I'm looking at this from the view of a pve'er, when I was the one who originally stated (when they first came out) that you shouldn't even be able to trade PO's or sell them on the market. I said the ONLY way to get them should be through pvp'ing and excess ones you earn could be cashed in for merits/recipe rolls, or for pvp "tickets" that can be stockpiled and redeemed for PO recipe rolls.

I was the guy saying: "pvp recipes, for pvp'ers, earned by pvp'ing and used for pvp"

Tbh I still think the only way a pvp loot system could work properly in this game is for the items to be soulbound (but able to be cashed in as mentioned if you don't need it). That’s because I personally think it should have nothing to do with pve’ers.

The way they are now they aren't a "reward" for pvp'ing to be used for pvp, they are more like compensation for time spent because not selling them is generally crazy.

Oh please, go on about these many builds with capped hp... or just fail at reading comprehension again.

I'm not even going to bother. You deliberately misquote and take things out of context, fail at reading comprehension, and are just flat out wrong.

We get it, you play with hp capped toons constantly and/or only stalkers and blasters (that have all hp accolades and fully IO'd), so the power is not worth your time and you believe aidother is far better. But at the same time you are so awesome that you don't take either of them.

You've been repeatedly disproved both mathematically and subjectively, but still you go on. Either you get it or you don't, you evidently don't. NBD.

The OP (and anyone reading the thread) has more than enough information to justify trying the power and determining its value relative to their needs.

The fact that you even use snowstorm in late game on part of these "uber" builds/teams you play with is pretty telling. But that is neither here nor there.

I'm glad that your teams don't need the extra mitigation of FW (or aidother on your builds according to you). Truth be told they probably don't need you at all.

There is nothing left to discuss, gl with your plight and have a good one.

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Dom's will soon have their damage brought down somewhat, I think it would behoove everyone to hold their tongues, really think about what's going on, and cast judgment "after" the nerfs in the next patch.

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This. They are being brought down about 20%, lets wait and see how that works out before constant whines give them the widow treatment.

For once in the history of negative adjustments, lets try to ensure it is reasonable and not a sledgehammer.

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Have you seen any whine threads about Darth Ronin lately?


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LOL...actually, he's busy taking advantage of being uber-buffed with his 4 accounts and 3 shotting things with his newly-buffed Dom. Hold + Snipe + Blast and anything but a tank is in serious trouble. His 'Lift' is doing something in the area of 300 pts. of damage in SC.

I like that Dom's got buffed, but it's no coincidence that you see swarms of them now in zone PvP...just like Widows in previous issues. Can't help but think there might be further adjustments than what was already discussed.

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If the dev's are true to form it will be a massive over compensation too

TL;DR version - you don't understand the difference between extrinsic and intrinsic motivation.

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But until that time the current crop of pvp IO's are the ONLY meaningful pvp rewards, and as far as we know the only ones coming. So putting them on a drop rate where engaging in active pvp does not reward them totally defeats their purpose.

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No, the ONLY meaningful PvPing reward is the actual PvPing itself. The thrill, the rush, the tactics of facing against real enemies, not drones waiting to be herded like cattle. There were PvPers before any PvP IOs were introduced. The loot concept is strictly a PvE ideal. It's why PvP-oriented games like Guild Wars de-emphasized loot and concentrated on builds and skill.

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This is just flat out untrue. Have you played Guildwars? Powers in that game are more like loot here. They are so desirable they offer the ability to BUY them with real money (along with pvp items).
*That would be like the option to buy a lvl 50 with full pvp IO's (and maybe purples) here. Would that be good or bad for pvp in Cox?

PvP'ing for the sake of pvp'ing is NOT reward enough evidently. Are you new to this game or other MMOrpg's? PvP for the sake of pvp was in this game for 10? issues and it didn't take off. And that was when it was actually a FUN system to use.

By your faulty logic we could just as easily claim that pve'ers pve for the sake of pve and rewards provide little to no driving force.

That would be pretty asinine though I think.

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Don't bother PvPing if you're going to PvP with a PvE mentality. If you actually wanted to PvP, you would try to be good first before even thinking about any loot you "deserved" for your effort. The learning curve and the reward curve is much, much steeper in PvP than in PvE.

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See, I did pvp a lot in this game, probably far more than you and quite frankly I put in the hours to get very good. This whole block of text I just quoted is just flat out ridiculous. It is inherently exclusive and implementing massive barriers to entry.

That was the perceived problem with old pvp. It didn't do very well numbers wise did it?

Don't bother unless you are already good? Ya that is a recipe to success.

Zone pvp is intended to be like a pick-up game of softball. If I stood there and started demanding to know how fast someone runs the 40' or how fast they can throw a ball, how high they can jump... and if they didn't meet my criteria I tell them to talk a walk??? Please, get over yourself.

There is a place for such demanding play, it is called organized arena pvp, where the pro's play.

What part of your brain is telling you that video game users subscribe to the belief that they need to practice for hours before they are entitled to some sort of tangible reward? It can't be the part that is grounded in reality.

I mean jeez, even in game tutorials HAVE to offer a tangible reward to be successful. But here you are saying people should practice for hours just cause they should. /e boggle.

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*I'll say this upfront, you'll have a heck of a time convincing me and most people (other than the dev's apparently) that something that is failing the purpose that it was intended is working as intended, or at the very least, not requiring attention.

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So you're saying the devs intended to have a bunch of wannabe-PvPers in the zones in search of loot?

If you were even an ioata of a PvPer, your effort would be on why PvPing itself is failing to be fun, not what loot you're unable to get.

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Not at all, the intention behind pvp rewards is to add incentive to TRY the activity in the first place and then reward continued participation. If they drop at a rate that most people will never get one, they fail at what they are designed to do.

Please stop attacking my integrity as a pvp'er. If you insist I'll go to the arena and wipe the floor with you. I've spent more time making suggestions of how to improve pvp in this game than you have probably spent pvp'ing.

Not everyone is intrinsically motivated. In fact most people are more driven by extrinsic factors (especially in video games where they are offered). Pvp'ing for the "fun" of it just isn't enough to drive many people. That isn't a bad thing, it just is. For MANY people, being extrinsically motivated IS fun.

Offer $50 bucks at the end of the day to whoever completes the most widgets and they suddenly start working harder than if you said "work harder because you enjoy being productive".

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It also doesn't really matter that they are on (or near) purple level IN pvp, DR takes care of that to ensure that makes little difference. The only meaningful benefit they bring is the ability to exempt down to lower pvp zones, which while good hardly warrants their current (and soon to be even rarer) status. That just doesn't carry the same meaning it does in pve.

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This is assuming that a player has hit DR for everything. These PvP IOs make a huge difference if someone hasn't hit DR yet. Even with DR, these still provide boosts in stats that are not normally found in any other set IOs.

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You don't understand how DR works.

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As a pvp reward they have failed - almost completely. It is time to set aside the preconceived notions of how they should be relative to pve counterparts. Shoehorning them into a specific criteria is why they have failed. It is why they will continue to fail, and why they will always fail until those incorrect beliefs are abandoned.

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It's really simple. If these are not worth their value in PvE, then don't get them for PvE use. If you're not going to put in a full-fledged effort to getting to the top of PvP, then just stay in your PvE realm and pretend these never existed. They're not for you.

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I like your exclusive attitude. You're 100% wrong, but I like it

For at least 15 years now it has been common knowledge that when designing a "loot" system you don't start by adding ONLY the most exclusive and hard to attain rewards. Otherwise they are meaningless to the vast majority of your users (jee that sounds familiar) and they don't function as an extrinsic motivator (carrot on a stick if you will).

How successful would IO's be in pve if they had only introduced purples? No crushing impacts, no ruins, etc. Just purples. Think it woudl take off, or fall on its face?

You can only implement such exclusive loot once you have also implemented a reward system for the "commoner". For a loot system to function it works off of the principle of progressive motivation. You get a taste and you want more, you get more and you want something better. Loot systems have a lot in common with the theory of "gateway" drugs. Make no mistake that loot is very addictive too lol, it drives an entire (highly successful) segment of the gaming market (ie hack n slash).

Anyway, currently (and as far as we know) the current batch of PvP IO's are all we have. If they drop like purples, they fail as a pvp reward. If that means they have to adjust the drop tables so some of the highly desirable ones drop less relative to the group then so be it. But pvp IO's as a whole are failing due to their excessively low drop rate. They are not performing the purpose they are intended.

In a perfect world where they implemented common pvp IO's and lesser pvp IO sets, then ya the current batch of PO's could retain their ridiculously low drop rate. But they haven't, and probably have no intention of making a full-fledged pvp reward system.

If next issue includes such a system, then great. But my magic 8 ball varies between "Reply hazy, try again" and "Outlook not so good". That still does nothing to change the fact that they implemented it backwards even if they do fix it.

If the choice is between a completely failed system and one that isn't. I think the choice is pretty clear.

There is really nothing further to discuss on the matter.

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To the OP: If you get Frostworks, get it late game. It's a low maintenance power which benefit most ATs, particularly the melee ones.

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I personally like it as soon as it is available. It's basically an impossibility that anyone has meaningful +hp at that stage of the game that would reduce the effectiveness of FW at all. Toons with dullpain are no where near perma until the late 40's.

Also defenses/mitigation are underdeveloped at that early for all AT's. Especially /cold who doesn't really start to shine both offensively or defensively on a team until they have sleet.

Adding 180hp (single green lvl 20 DO) to two people out of the box is actually pretty significant. I usually drop it on the lead agro sponge (brute usually) and a Dom. A less timid dom is a lot like a less timid blaster. Very good.

By lvl 22 w/ a single green SO it is adding just shy of 300hp to your two most agro hungry allies. That isn't just good, that is very good for an unslotted power.

It is one of the most powerful single slot powers in the game.

It's so powerful that you barely need to enhance it (does Forge suck because it provides great tohit and +dam in base form? *I realize you can't improve the +dam aspect). I think that is a good thing myself, but then again I like that I don't need to also slot recovery aura for additional recovery. I get sick of things being "the suck" until you 5-6 slot it.

Regardless, I think we're all in agreement (aside from Turbo) that FW is a worthwhile pick. When you take it is up to the user, just like anything.

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With no IO bonus or accolades and only using Dull Pain:
Tankers: 12.43% from hp cap
Scrappers: 21% from hp cap
Brutes: 55.29% from hp cap
Crabs: 66% from hp cap
If they have all their accolades and IOs the hp bonus is going to be about 30% +/- 2%. However even if we leave that out Brutes and Crabs are the only ones that aren't going to hit their cap without 2 Heal SOs slotted into frostworks. Scrappers and Tankers cap out at zero Heal SOs slotted.


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Last time I checked (and admittedly it was yesterday, so things may be different now) Brutes are an exceedingly popular AT redside.

Willpower and sheilds are the most common secondaries I see right now.

You only team with blueside in co-op zones.

Only TWO brute secondaries have dullpain (invuln and stone) that leaves SEVEN other sets that don't. (unless we include /ea in god mode) Of those two secondaries the percentage of players that have perma-dullpain is statistically insignificant.
*FW is very important to use on /ea though because they use typed defense, so arc fog no longer benefits them (defensively) and the ice shields have holes to fire, cold and PSI (which /ea is already weak to). That same goes for the 99.9% of invuln users that aren't perma dullpain w/ full accolades.

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Here in lies the problem, Frostworks is the only buff in the game you could possibly call situational. Fort, shields, SB, etc. all are useful no matter what AT they are cast on, but a especially useful for those that need the attribute the most. Frostworks however limits itself to only being real useful to Brutes/Scrappers/Tankers/EATs that have awful mitigation.

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So first you blanket apply uber builds when discussing +hp, but then you ignore uber builds when discussing things like +def.

I see FAR more softcapped characters roaming around than one's anywhere near their hp cap. By your faulty logic we could just as easily say that the cold shields are situational, or that the positional only def of arc fog is situational, or that fortitude is situational.

But that just isn't true, not often enough to even warrant entertaining the idea.

The "situations" where FW is of poor value are exceedingly rare. You have to actively look to find them.

I will say that one great thing about taking FW on a FIRE/cold is that it makes your allies "feel" much sturdier (because they are MUCH sturdier). So they will just dive right in with no hesitation. That is very important because if you play with timid people the agro a fire/cold will gather is (ime) unparalleled.

I do not like requiring a babysitter, so I make everyone around me alleviate that need. I can't control how well someone else takes care of me, but I can control how much stronger I make my teammates and that greatly reduces the necessity of anyone watching over me.

There is more to using FW that just impressive numbers for an aoe agro monster like Fire/cold.

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Incidentally anyone try a Dark/EM Tanker? I would think that combo would actually work fairly well (OG + Whirling Hands).

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Dark/stone. Fault+OG = aoe boss stuns. Perma. Tanktroller to the extreme.

Dark/em does make a neat vampire-ish build or something where your life is constantly draining (ET+OG) and you need to feed off of people with dark regen.

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Anyway, I've yet to see any convincing reason from Dev's or players that indicates pvp IO's should be exceedingly difficult to acquire through pvp activity. The market will take care of itself it you take care of the root issue.

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Unfortunately, the particular PvP IOs that were released are "purple" level IOs, in regards to their PvP performance. Since they're "PvP" IOs and only drop in PvP, using their PvE performance as a guage is not accurate. Thus, they will need to have "purple" level drop rate in PvP. Apparently, the devs decided the effort it took to kill 5000 level 50 mobs to get a purple drop is roughly equal to the effort it took to kill 100 players to get a PvP IO drop. PvP has a much smaller population, so the absolute number of drops will be proportional to that. In other words, the percentage of PvErs that have purples should be roughly equal to the percentage of PvPers that have these particular PvP IOs.

The dev's mistake was not introducing crappier PvP IOs, ones that don't exmplar, much smaller set bonuses, and even without any PvP-only set bonuses. These could drop more often at a relative rate comparable to the crappier PvE IO sets.

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All of which I already stated.

But until that time the current crop of pvp IO's are the ONLY meaningful pvp rewards, and as far as we know the only ones coming. So putting them on a drop rate where engaging in active pvp does not reward them totally defeats their purpose.

Hence their predictable, expected, and resulting failure.

*I'll say this upfront, you'll have a heck of a time convincing me and most people (other than the dev's apparently) that something that is failing the purpose that it was intended is working as intended, or at the very least, not requiring attention.

It also doesn't really matter that they are on (or near) purple level IN pvp, DR takes care of that to ensure that makes little difference. The only meaningful benefit they bring is the ability to exempt down to lower pvp zones, which while good hardly warrants their current (and soon to be even rarer) status. That just doesn't carry the same meaning it does in pve.

You haven't done anything yet to show otherwise.

On the other hand, supporting what I'm saying is that:

As a pvp reward they have failed - almost completely. It is time to set aside the preconceived notions of how they should be relative to pve counterparts. Shoehorning them into a specific criteria is why they have failed. It is why they will continue to fail, and why they will always fail until those incorrect beliefs are abandoned.

fire/fire is hands down st king. High recharge means high uptime on FE, means nothing even comes close. I'd be confident saying a high recharge fire/fire could put out 40% more damage than the next closest secondary.

Aoe? slotted+FE firebreath does 266 damage. Slotted psw+psyscream does 282 damage. As crappy as combustion is it can do 16 damage. That also discounts FE boosted hotfeet+cages

That said, fire/psy is still better at aoe over time, you don't have FE up constantly (over 50% is easy though) and both psy aoe's are entirely front-loaded, which compared to combustion. Well lets just say combustion is horrid. Additionally PSW hits 16 targets and DP is just amazing at fueling both the necessary survivability to pump out high aoe damage unfettered and to fuel the end costs.