Gilfred

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I can go back to your first post and remind you that for every reason including concept that a player would state why they would chose it you would say do not take it. Your very title even says the same thing. Now I see the word I was missing thanks to Ice and that is opinion. Now every guide does have some opinions. But out of all of the guides that I have seen this is the first that says to never use a set.

No guide should ever do that. A guide is there to tell you how to use it, not to avoid it becaue it is not optimal. To avoid it because it is not like the fire and forget sets. This guide and your posts are trying to sway the readers to not take it and maybe go looking for the optimal or you could say only take the best set for brutes.

I have no doubt that others that have written guides may have hated what they were writing about but kept that hatred out of their guide as they should. Because hatred causes an individual to not see straight and do things that they later regret. That is something that I have seen many times over.

Your guide can say if you want have an efficient or optimal secodary for a brute then DA is not for you. If you do not want a secondary that will make you a melee troller then DA is not for you. Then your guide should've had how to slot DA and what primaries are good for DA. Next you guide should've showed the stragety for playing the DA brute with various primaries, only showing all primaries if you have had experience with them or can easily tell how they mesh with DA.

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Why?

There was no way I could honestly write a guide that gave Dark Armor ANY kind of endorsement, from a personal opinion standpoint, but on the other side of the coin, it's a set that gets a lot of praise, but also a lot of misinformation and misrepresentation of what the set is capable of.

I think the question here, is if someone is going to give you a guide and assessment to a set, would you rather have them not point out the problems with the set, make it all glowy rosy and sweet, and then bump into those problems yourself?

People insert flavor and opinion into their guides all the time, because lots of people don't want to read a boring, cut and dry list of information about a set that has nothing but factual information and no insight by the player at all.

Gil, I've enjoyed your contributions to the thread, and sorry if you feel some form of insult at the guide itself. Dark Armor was my second 50, and I couldn't have made it if it was "unplayable". But -ESPECIALLY- in CoV, where every other 40+ mission seems to drop an EB in your lap, and more and more mobs use tactics rarely seen blue side by Dark Armor scrappers, I can't reccomend the set at all.

That would be dishonest, and it's not something Im going to do.

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The majority of guides that I have read do not say never take a set or give it there full endorsement. What they do give is there knowledge of the set along with their experience with the set. They let the reader decide if it is for them or not. They do not try to make that decision for them. They tell the reader what to expect from the set, how to slot it and what powers are optional according to them. But they still do not endorse it or say never to chose the set.

When I first started playing this game I learned alot about this game from the forums by reading the guides here. They helped me decide for myself what AT's and sets that would be right for me. Since I am a very flexible I could use just about any AT or set. If you doubt me then look at the other guides here in this forum and you will see a guides that do just that.

When I read a guide I want to know how to get the most out of a set, not do not take it because it stinks. I know that I can make that decision for myself thank you. I want to learn if there are any special strageties for playing that set. I do not want to read about any bad experiences a player has with the set.

With that final statement are you saying that you are the only one that can take a DA brute to fifty.

I can go back to your first post and remind you that for every reason including concept that a player would state why they would chose it you would say do not take it. Your very title even says the same thing. Now I see the word I was missing thanks to Ice and that is opinion. Now every guide does have some opinions. But out of all of the guides that I have seen this is the first that says to never use a set.

No guide should ever do that. A guide is there to tell you how to use it, not to avoid it becaue it is not optimal. To avoid it because it is not like the fire and forget sets. This guide and your posts are trying to sway the readers to not take it and maybe go looking for the optimal or you could say only take the best set for brutes.

I have no doubt that others that have written guides may have hated what they were writing about but kept that hatred out of their guide as they should. Because hatred causes an individual to not see straight and do things that they later regret. That is something that I have seen many times over.

Your guide can say if you want have an efficient or optimal secodary for a brute then DA is not for you. If you do not want a secondary that will make you a melee troller then DA is not for you. Then your guide should've had how to slot DA and what primaries are good for DA. Next you guide should've showed the stragety for playing the DA brute with various primaries, only showing all primaries if you have had experience with them or can easily tell how they mesh with DA.

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Okay so everyone then has to either use a word or state the same thing by its definition in order for those to be able to say he said that.

Then I could write a guide saying that powerset x for AT y is useless. But if I do not use the word then players said that I said it is useless is wrong. All I would have to do is to say powerset x is the weakest so never use it. But remember what it does well is covered by the other sets so never use it. Unless you are looking for a challenge or for concept. But still the other sets are so much better. The OP really wants to say it is useless but he knows that he cannot say that without getting alot of nasty pm's and having nasty replies. Also his guide would've been instantly locked and deleted if he did.

Regardless of anything positive the OP says about DA he still says never use it for your brute.

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Perhaps, but once again you are taking an assumption on his meaning based on "reading between the lines." If you wish to find out if he thought the set as useless, then ask him for clarification on whether or not he does feel the set useless. If he answers positively to that, then you can make such a claim. Otherwise, you're reading into a conclusion that is not presented.

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There are times when you have to read between the lines in order to understand what the writer of the document is trying to tell you. And that is because the writer maybe vague in telling you what he really means. More so with legal papers.

The OP has a hatred for DA and his guide is here to cause players to never chose DA. Answer this question honestly, would you tell a player to never chose a set if it is useful? Also answer this honestly, even though the OP will try to keep players from chosing DA when someone else using numbers to show him he is wrong he backs down (does a 180), and still tries to convince the readers to never take it. Why does he do this?

IMHO it is illogical to tell a player never to use a set that is useful. Also you did not address my other two points in your reply to me. Is his guide really trying to get the readers to only play the FoTM's or the min/max builds. I know that DA may not be a FoTM.

Based on the evidence presented here by the other posters clearly show that DA is not as bad as the OP is trying to convince us it is. DA is not useless like the OP seems to be saying by the title of his guide. Is DA the bottom of the barrel as far as brute secondaries, maybe but the same could be said about any other set that is the bottom of the barrel as far as that AT goes. I still say that it is a good powerset that takes skill to play. It is not a fire and forget set. It is a set with a mixed bag of defense/damage resist/and utilities. It is a set IMHO that takes a player that knows this game to get the best results.

Finally let's say that there is a fire. A reporter writes a story that is published in the newspaper in it he says that it was a big fire. Let's also say that one of the firemen writes a story that calles the fire a four alarm fire and it is published in a different newspaper. Who is right, is the reporter or the firefighter? Actually both are right because they are writing according to their knowledge of the subject.

I am using the above as an example of the fact that there are many ways of saying the same thing.

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And the parts Arcanaville highlighted in yellow clearly say "don't ever play this." If no one should ever play it it's pretty useless, no?

Try less hard.

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The goal is to prevent anyone from ever considering playing the set for any reason than concept, or the fact they -want- the game to be difficult.

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Aside from that one, which I'll focus on.

There are two ways to play this game.

1. Efficient. Getting the best results you can within a character, top bang-for-buck and the like. THIS is what the OP is saying /DA doesn't play too well at. But at the same time the above quote allows for...

2. Characterful. Playing the game how YOU like and YOU enjoy. Play that FF/Energy Offender, just have fun.

The OP isn't saying "NEVER PLAY /DA! Delete it from the game!" He's saying that you can play it if you want, but don't expect it to be FOTM any time soon.

Additional:

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So just look at the OP title:

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Why you should never play a Dark Armor Brute.

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That sounds like someone saying something is useless to me.

You fail.

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Dude, that's not saying something is useless at all.

I buy a car. Not a great car, but it works at getting me from A to B. Someone else buys a BETTER car for the same price, it gets him from A to B quicker and safer. My car still has a use (the A->B mentioned above), but if the option is available for the better car, it makes sense to get it if I'm after the best car I can get.

So, because there are better cars then my own for the same price, does that make my car useless? Not at all. It's just not as good.

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Look the OP does not have to say that it is useless in his post but he can hint at it or beat around the bush about saying it. He knows full well the response he would get if he said that it is useless so he chose to go the route he did in his posts.

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I see the OP saying that playing it is a bad idea, that it is overall weak and ineffective, and that other than concept or difficulty, one should not play /DA, but at no point does he say that it is useless. There IS a difference. Even /EA is weak and ultimately ineffective, but by no means useless.

So yes, please, try harder.

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IMHO the OP is like some people that do not want to say what they really feel because they know what would happen if they did. Just like people would not say what the radio announcer did about a girls basketball team that got him in trouble. Instead they beat around the bush and hint at it. That is what the OP is doing. He is hinting at DA is useless, because he know that if he says it is useless he would get all kinds of nasty pm's and responses.

The title of the thread alone along with the body of the post is basically saying he is trying to prevent players from ever using DA for brutes. He is the type that may even try to do the same while he is in the game. If players never use a set then you have to ask the question why. The logical conclusion would be either he is trying to get everyone to play the FoTM's of the month, the min/max builds or he is saying to stay away from DA because it is useless without really saying it. The word useless does not have to be in his post in order for him to say it.

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No, actually Im not invalidating anything haetron. I challenge you to find an instance of a single RSF team that has EVER been formed on these boards made up of any 8 members of a single AT that did not at least use one of the most commonly used temp powers.

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So, by using temps that allow any all-AT LRSF a successful completion, you're going to prove that /DA is superior? Hell, even an All-Stalker team completed the LRSF using nukes.

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Also, I challenge ANY other power-set combination of Brutes to do the same thing. You make it sound so simple, yet I have never heard any thread or topic mentioned about a successful all-brute RSF. If it's so simple a task that any armor set could do it, please provide a link to the post containing proof that it has happened.

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This was done on the Liberty server, and is not even the first completed All Brute LRSF.

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I do not think that anyone is trying to say that dark is superior, but in the same breath it is not totally useless either.

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Interestingly enough, the OP didn't state /DA as useless, yet some have no problem attributing that to him.

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Why say never use something that is useful, unless he is implying that it is useless. It is that word never that is the whole point of the thread and is what is bothering me. I still say that this thread should've been titled Why Dark Armor Should not be your First Brute. Or he could've suggested that before playing a dark armor brute to play a dark armor scrapper. I have no doubt that dark armor has it problems. Heck all stalker primaries that are not EM are paled in comparison beside it (as I have seen here in the forums). If true then does that mean the only stalkers that should exist in the game are EM? What is there going to be a guide that says if you do not play the FoTM build you will get owned in both PvE and PvP?

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I think he's saying it's kinda pathetic for a fully IO'd out EM/DA to get clobbered by a four man spawn of easy critters. I'd agree with that. My Stalker (fully IO'd, of course) can take out a spawn twice that size in near complete safety.

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Remember the player did say that his brute is not fully IO'd. You see only the devs could tell if DA brutes suffer more defeats than other brute secondaries. Only the devs would be able to tell if dark armor is underperforming as far as brutes are concerned. As far as your stalker is concerned you could be a better player you know.

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No, actually Im not invalidating anything haetron. I challenge you to find an instance of a single RSF team that has EVER been formed on these boards made up of any 8 members of a single AT that did not at least use one of the most commonly used temp powers.

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So, by using temps that allow any all-AT LRSF a successful completion, you're going to prove that /DA is superior? Hell, even an All-Stalker team completed the LRSF using nukes.

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Also, I challenge ANY other power-set combination of Brutes to do the same thing. You make it sound so simple, yet I have never heard any thread or topic mentioned about a successful all-brute RSF. If it's so simple a task that any armor set could do it, please provide a link to the post containing proof that it has happened.

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This was done on the Liberty server, and is not even the first completed All Brute LRSF.

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I do not think that anyone is trying to say that dark is superior, but in the same breath it is not totally useless either.

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Ok, I have noticed a few things cropping up in this thread which... interest me.

Certain concepts are being touted as objective descriptors and facts whilst they appear to be subjective to me.

Examples:
What exactly is the Brute playstyle?
What exactly is 'Fighting continuously' through a mission?

Since these two, plus some others (don't feel like digging back through the thread to find them at the moment), appear to be subjective concepts rather than objective facts, I became curious.

I decided that a better way than bandying words about would be for me to show you how I play and you describe it to me in these subjective contexts so that I (and others) may better understand each other's positions and meanings.

This is a video (cut to 10 minutes due to Youtube not letting me post anything longer) of me running one of my Brutes.

Yes, she is dark armor and the toggles she is running are Dark Embrace, Murky Cloud, Obsidian Shield, Combat Jumping, Death Shroud, and Oppresive Gloom.

Beyond that, I do not wish to influence your response by explaining things as I see them, so watch the video through and let me know what it says to you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDyyQc6-0-o

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To everyone:

A picture speaks a thousand words...

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It spoke quite a few to me.

1. lol faceplant on first spawn.

2. Higher res please, so we can see exactly what's going on.

3. We all know that a mission loaded with FAMILY mob types is a true test of merit.

Plus, of course, no mention of the build, or what sets have been sunk into it so it can achieve the mighty task of faceplanting to a Warhulk.

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Oh and you have never been beaten using any other brute secondary. Why I guess you can say you have been unbeaten in the PvE and maybe the PvP portions of the game since you first started playing huh. What I am saying is that if being beaten is like the unforgivable sin then all powersets would fall short there. Hell my main has five debt badges so I know about getting beaten.

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Ok, I have noticed a few things cropping up in this thread which... interest me.

Certain concepts are being touted as objective descriptors and facts whilst they appear to be subjective to me.

Examples:
What exactly is the Brute playstyle?
What exactly is 'Fighting continuously' through a mission?

Since these two, plus some others (don't feel like digging back through the thread to find them at the moment), appear to be subjective concepts rather than objective facts, I became curious.

I decided that a better way than bandying words about would be for me to show you how I play and you describe it to me in these subjective contexts so that I (and others) may better understand each other's positions and meanings.

This is a video (cut to 10 minutes due to Youtube not letting me post anything longer) of me running one of my Brutes.

Yes, she is dark armor and the toggles she is running are Dark Embrace, Murky Cloud, Obsidian Shield, Combat Jumping, Death Shroud, and Oppresive Gloom.

Beyond that, I do not wish to influence your response by explaining things as I see them, so watch the video through and let me know what it says to you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDyyQc6-0-o

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To everyone:

A picture speaks a thousand words, and this picture shows that DA is a very good set for Brutes. No problems with fury, because the entire time she stayed very close to max fury. Just only one death where she used her rez. I wonder just how many deaths would the other secondaries suffer compared to dark. If it is none then is just one extra death really that bad? Not at all, everyones experience with the brute secondaries will be different, as different as night and day in some cases.

The same holds true for the rest of the AT's.

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A guide to the multiple and glaring weakspots in Dark Armor, and an assessment on why, despite any ideal numerical simulations, the set requires more effort for less return when compared to the majority of the brute secondaries?

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The set requires more effort for more return. No one says its an easy set to play. But the maximum return deliverable by the set is a purely numerical issue, and has nothing to do with player skill or game environment. Only how hard it is to get it is.

Also, whenever someone says "despite the numbers..." I tend to want to remind them that while there exist people who evaluate powersets numerically only, I'm not one of them. I've played dark armor on a brute specifically from level 1 to level 50, and specifically played her in all aspects of the game, from soloing to tanking to PvP to end game content. Other people can have different experience from mine, but no one can reasonably claim better or superceding experience in terms of evaluating the set.

The set performs basically the way the numbers imply it does. Of course, if you run your numbers correctly (i.e. the same way the game engine does), it basically has to.

There are lots of ways to improve dark armor. There are even more ways to ruin the set. The performance is so good, I would rather the devs stay far, far, far away from it. On the list of things I would want the devs to look at, Brute Dark Armor isn't even in last place on it: its nowhere on it.

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I don't want the Devs to look at Dark Armor at all either, actually. It's not so far underperforming that its unplayable, its just been my experience that of all the available sets, it's the worst.

Im curious, for the DA supporters. What exactly is this magical "more return" point? What is it that DA can do, that the other sets can't do with a proper build/loadout? Thats my main issue with the set. I keep hearing "Its capable of so much!" but I don't hear any real examples.

And Deus, if you're using nukes for your RSF run, you're pretty much invalidating yourself, and you know it. There's nothing DA can do with that nuke support that a team of 8 any other brutes can't.

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And it is posts like this that confuse me. How can you say that the set is not unplayable, but in your opinion it is the worst. Yet in the title of this thread you say you should never play one. How can a set be playable but still you should avoid it. That makes no sense. A set is either not playable and useless so you should avoid it or it is playable but like others have said it is an advanced set that is best used after you have played other sets. It cannot be both.

The whole purpose of the thread is to get players to avoid DA for brutes at the very least. And maybe at the most to get those playing it to stop. I think that with posts like this your guide should've been titled Why DA Brute Should not be your First Brute. I think you are missing the whole point of DA and more important is when you mix dark melee with it. Both together is like having a utility belt for your character. You not only have good attacks but good utility to back you up.

If you have ever read the DM/DA bible that I think is still here in this forum. The OP of the Guide says that those powersets are the most misunderstood. Of course this was written for scrappers, not brutes because this was before CoV.

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I have just planned out a DM/DA brute. I also have a build for an invul/EM tanker. Both will have set IO's. When they both have their set IO's and are at level 50 my Brutes energy resistance will be about 23%, my tanker at about 27%. So then why are you not up in arms about the invulnerable tankers and tell others not to play an invulnerable tanker?

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Because the guide is about Dark Armor, and comparison of sets baseline attributes? Some of the things done with IOs are great, true, but this is an extra level of investment to an already difficult to play, sub-par set.

Plus, saying "I can build to do this" doesn't do much good without providing an actual build to support the claim. Could you actually post the Dark Armor and Invulnerable builds?

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Before I actually post any builds tell me now what sets that an Invul/EM tanker or a DM/DA brute can take that would increase resistance to energy. Not any that I know of, now I could be wrong though. Let's stick with the brutes for this post.
I will use Mid's numbers. Here is the unslotted energy resistance for all brute secondaries. No tier nine's at all.

Dark: 15%
Electric: 61%
Energy: 9.4% although it is balanced by having a 20.6% def versus energy
Fire: 22.5%
Invulnerability: 13.1% which could not be balanced by a measly 4.6% defense versus energy
Stone: 0% and gets a 12% defense versus energy. Like to know how that could be balanced in your eyes.
Willpower: 5.6% offset by a 9.8% defense versus energy.

So if we are to go by the resistance numbers then the player must avoid not only DA, but all other secondaries except fire and electric. But yet you talk about DA. Now even though that energy damage is common, why did the devs in your opinion short change all other brute secondaries as far as energy resistance? I decided to add the defense numbers of the sets that had defense versus energy because they may tend to help a little bit. Just look at those numbers alone would make any shy away from them right, because everyone must be maxed out on energy resistance.

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Except, those transitional periods almost never come up in casual game play, people save their Tier 9's for situations where they will actually need them, and don't fire them the instant they're available just because they are there. Im not trying to pretend that T9 resistance numbers are permanent parts of gameplay, but then, Toxic damage almost never is either.

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Then I think that then you undercut the premise of some of your own guide. If you use tier-9 performance to establish (conditional) superiority, then admit that people reserve that for when needed, then you need to analyze the comparative performance in terms of what happens when those things actually are needed.

Imagine you've got Elder Snakes, a DA and an ELA. The DA has some resistance and a big heal. In general, this is a good situation to be in - the DR alone is probably not enough, but it takes the edge off the damage to buy more time for the heal. The ELA has no resistance and a smaller but faster heal that may be interrupted by DoTs. The ELA might actually need his Power Surge there to match the pace the DA can roll at. The problem is it wears out - what then?

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You can actually of course, pace yourself between spawns, but no, you do point out a situation where Dark Armor would outdo Electric Armor.

It's also only one specific story arc, for the entire game.

Now, how often do you face Energy damage, and how often do you face Toxic?

One of the key factors of my dislike of Dark Armor is it's "gift" of being slightly better on a few resistances to less common resisted damage types ((Psionic especially)), but at the cost of having glaring holes to a common effect and damage types.

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I have just planned out a DM/DA brute. I also have a build for an invul/EM tanker. Both will have set IO's. When they both have their set IO's and are at level 50 my Brutes energy resistance will be about 23%, my tanker at about 27%. So then why are you not up in arms about the invulnerable tankers and tell others not to play an invulnerable tanker?

IMHO I believe that you as well as those that agree with you suffer more deaths due to fury lock than those that do not complain and just play their DA brutes. Also all of you may even suffer much more deaths due to fury lock, scrapper lock and maybe the new defiance lock than any other player. Still I would never make a guide that would tell players to never chose a set.

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Exactly why can't you click them when you need them? The only reason you could not, would be if you had used them previously, and that still shows their overall usefulness.

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This appears terribly flawed to me. You cannot simply assess their availability with such sweeping terms. An example of how to analyze this sort of thing is in Arcanaville's comparative surivivability comparisons. You have to compare both uptime of clicks versis consistent value of toggles/passives and the more discrete effects of needing to click things (there are transitional periods where you simply cannot activate the power even when you want it).


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Except, those transitional periods almost never come up in casual game play, people save their Tier 9's for situations where they will actually need them, and don't fire them the instant they're available just because they are there. Im not trying to pretend that T9 resistance numbers are permanent parts of gameplay, but then, Toxic damage almost never is either.

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I know you may find this quite silly but your whole thread actually makes me want to roll a DM/DA brute. I will choose DM since I have experience about that primary. The thing is I think that just like DM/DA scrapper power sets are misunderstood by many the same is true for the brute.

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I still don't think the OP is being serious.

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Im being completely serious. Im hearing a lot of "OMG UR POST IS WRONG" but nothing disputing the actual numbers or observations in the guide.

Fury generation is caused by two conditions. One is attacking, the other is being attacked.

If you're surrounded by five enemies, you attack one, the five attack you, that's Six times Fury is generated.

If you're surrounded by five enemies, and using Cloak of Fear you fear all five, and attack one, the one attacks you, the other four quiver, that's two times fury is being generated.

If you're surrounded by five enemies, and you use oppressive gloom to stun those five enemies, and attack one, that's 1 time Fury is generated.

And that alone is only a small part of why Dark Armor is an inferior brute set. This isn't as large an issue on Scrappers, because A. Scrappers aren't competing with tanker armor sets in their AT, and B. Scrappers don't rely on fury for damage.

I'll address other issues brought up with the guide at a later point, posting time is limited right now.

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First I would never make a guide suggesting that players never take any power or powerset. You have already been told that DA is a good secondary for brutes. I know that it is not the secondary that you can turn on all of your toggles and mindlessly mesh your attack buttons and win the fight. It requires some thought and some planning to make it work.

Also if I were to look really hard I would not doubt that I would be able to find that just about every set in all AT's at one time or another have been declared the worst by other players and they defend their stand vigorously. Meaning that if I went by that then I would never play this game again. At least not until the sets made you into a god.

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I've never found a scrapper secondary nearly as fun as DA. However, I don't think I'd like it on a brute, for many of the reasons above, the primary being AVs and my tank mindframe of brute playage.

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I am sure that you are aware that brutes were not designed to be tanks. Brutes are brutes not tankers, they never have been or ever will be.

Does the flashback system mean that when we use it and exemplar will we get recipes an salvage that is the level of the missions or story arc? I am concerned about the fix to defiance. I know that soon blasters will see the fix to defiance, so I hope that it will be able to be part of issue 11. I know that even when the news on a new issue is released there is usually more features added to the issue.

We are undetermined, at this point, on how long the initial invasion is going to last. It will go on for at least two weeks, and we may extend that time depending on how players react. But, it will become a permanent part of the game. So, we might re-activate the invasion whenever there is a lull. Also, some of the new content, like completing one of the Rikti War Zone missions, will trigger an attack on a separate game zone.

IMHO I think that it is okay to have the initial invasion lasting a short time but to have this invasion continuely by means of a mission in the Rikti zone and when there are lulls will get old pretty fast. Also it will get annoying for heroes and villians to either duck for cover or take on the Rikti when all they want to do is go to their mission. And more so if it causes alot of debt.

Updated my guide to influence and infamy.

A guide to influence and infamy for I9

Even though there are players that like this gude I felt the need to update it for I9. And I will try to give advice for those that want to gain the influence for their costume pieces that they need.

This guide is for everyone.

1.) Sell all enchancements that you cannot use. Sell all invention salvage and recipes until level 12. If you want a certain costume piece then only buy the normal enhancements like TO's, DO's and SO's (depending on the level of toon you are playing) until you either get the costume piece in a drop or buy it.

2.) Before selling check the price for the recipes and salvage at the stores and then go to the market to see if you can get a better price at the market or the store.

3.) Do not buy to keep all of your enhancements green. Now you can use common IO's to save on your influence. You can use level 15's and wait to replace them with level 25's

4.) Change your enhancements every five levels. You can either chose to do so at levels like 13,18, 23, ...etc, or you can chose levels 12,17, 22, ...etc. This only is true for the normal enhancements (TO"s, DO's, and SO"s).

5.) Sell enhancements at the proper stores. Sell as soon as you get a full tray unless you are on a team or on a timed mission. Avoid deleting, the reason is because almost every time I have deleted a TO to open room for a DO or SO I have gotten a TO of lesser value. Avoid deleting anything if possible, this includes invention salvage and recipes.

6.) Exemplar out of sg/vg mode if possible. Now with I9 you may not need to do much exemplaring. I have goten some good influence streetsweeping in the pvp zones, from the drops I got.

7.) Do lower level tasks forces out of sg/vg mode if possible.
With I9 you may not need to do this, because the salvage and the recipes that you will be getting will sell for a lot of inf either at the market or the stores.

8.) Play one level in sg/vg mode and one level out, starting at level 25 where you start losing influence if possible. This may not be needed as much with I9. You maybe able to play in sg/vg mode all of the time.

9.) Use enhancements from drops.

10.) Leave the mission as soon as you have completed it. Do not stick around to clean up the rest of enemies left. Usually the amount of enemies left are worth less then the mission bonus. You are trying to get as many mission bonuses per level as possible. Remember if you do run out of content concerning story arcs, then do safeguard missions to cover the gap. I will make this one optional if you want to mop up everthing then go ahead, because defeating those extra enemies may give you a rare invention salvage drop that could net you millions.

11.) Do not frequently change your difficulty settings. Optional due to I9.

12.) Do not frequently change your costumes. Optional due to I9

13.) You maybe wondering when do I use set IO's? The only thing I can say that is dependant on if you need a costume recipe or not. If you do then you can wait to use IO's until you have the costume piece that you need. As far as level wise I cannot help you with that answer. Because this guide is not for that.

Using most of these suggestions I have mentioned above, my main in my sig has his dragon wings (for concept) and has over 10 mil inf.

If I have missed anything please feel free to add to my suggestions.

To me it is not hard at all to make a plan on how you will use the invention IO sets. If you know what bonuses are important to you then you collect those sets. If the bonus do not grab your attention and the chance to proc IO's do not float your boat then mix and match sets to get the amount of damage/acc/end redux and recharge that you want or use level 30 common IO's like SO's and you never have to replace them so you will do just fine.

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Hi,

Overall I like the number of possibilities that inventions open up.

I would say this though. You have given us percentages on how much enhancements affect powers, told us the exact amount set bonuses will give to our characters, but I still cant make an informed choice from in game about which power I should choose.

At this point any concept of hiding numbers from the players is pretty much gone given the amount of information available, but with the aditional numbers in I9 it seems pretty weak to have to go to an external website to get the numbers I need to make fairly basic choices about my character.

More work on documenting the new invention system would also have been good. For instance, what does +10% regen for 120 seconds mean in a passive?

Overall I'm very pleased with the invention system, it is a good balance, providing opportunities without requiring people to pay it much attention. It also gives people much more flexibility in how they go about building their character. I look forward to greater diversity in the builds.

Cheers,
Conker

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If you want an I9 hero/villian builder there is one here in the inventions forum IIRC. It really is not all that hard at all planing for in game. You decide how do I want my toon to handle incoming damage, mezing, dealing damage, control, defense, damage resist, etc... Do I want to use the set bonuses to help then plan on getting the sets. Do I just want to tweak the acc/dam/end redux/recharge of my powers then mixing sets will do fine. Do I want to just build as normal using the common IO's. The sky is the limit here.

I will use one of my toons as an example. Even though I have not played her much since I9 went live. She is a pure fire blaster. I will use devastion's chance to hold in all of her ranged attacks to give her a soft control in order to handle some of the mezing in the game. Add a good acc/dam/end redux to her powers because I will not use fitness with her at all.

Will explain my vote. I do not care too much for the new TF, never was much for TF's too begin with. The same for the new hammy raid especially so if it is a lag fest.

But the rest of I9 I love. The new IO enhancements sell themselves because they never wear out. You are not forced to upgrade them every five levels. You can take your time and upgrade them when you want too or just leave them as is.
The votes shows that I am right about the point that IO enhancements can stand on their own merits, they really sell themselves. They do not need costumes pieces to aid in selling themselves to players. I love the new costume pieces even though I may only use a few of them, but again that is my choice and mine only.

Thank you for this poll Ex Libris. Who agrees with me that the devs should be thanked for giving us this poll?

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Reasons why devs might be silent on an issue:

1) We didn't see the issue. There are a lot of threads out there.
2) We are in the middle of looking at an issue, and saying anything at the time might be invalidated. Even something like "we are looking into it" can be read as "we are going to change it" if we look at it and find it to be fine, we would get blasted for not changing it when we said we would.
3) The answer is already being given by a lot of players already
4) The answer is obvious (and thus will eventually be given out by a lot of players, see #3).
5) It involves talking about stuff we can't/shouldn't be talking about.
6) The question is a "when" question. We rarely answer these, because even when we put disclaimers on it, our answer becomes taken as gospel, and if we fail to deliver, we look bad.

There's a secret 7th reason that I am not going to give you because of reason #7.

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Regardless of your reasons I think that you should've told the player base before I9 hit that the dev team intended for costume recipes to be commodities that they would seek and pay top inf for. If you did then the player base would not have thought that they would've been able to get those new pieces easily for both their new toons as well as their older toons. It would not have caused sour grapes (so to speak) or bad blood. Players can take it better when they are told up front than when it is hidden from them.

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Well, let's see: The public and historical timelines suggest that we have 3-4 months between issues. We have a feature added in that issue that includes random costume drop rewards.

Now, since that's a feature that is expected to continue to be in use through the next issue, it makes sense that the random costume drops would be paced to remain desirable through that time period. That means they should remain somewhat in demand, which in turn means that they'll have value. Naturally, early adopters- those willing to pay more- will be satisfied first.

It's beyond common sense- it's downright BASIC that it would be ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS to have a system that satisfied demand in the first 2 weeks... only to have months of unsellable, no-demand rewards dropping. Heck, might as well make them basic costume options then.

Even if you missed that train of thought from the interviews (which did identify these costumes as rather rare rewarss) you could note the same thing on the test server or all the player forum posts on the subject preceding launch.

I don't think the devs were wrong in assuming that most rational people would understand that these would be infrequent drops that will remain in demand for AT LEAST the first month.

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I see you miss the point of my post. It had nothing to do with those pieces being desirable. No if those pieces remained exclusive only to the level 50's of the game had no bearing on my point (more later). Look everyone that wants them want to be able to complete their concept (whether you agree with that or understand it or not) before level 50. Maybe to keep them desirable they need to make it where you would have to play for about 5,000 hours with the toon you want it for then you would get it in a drop or have enough inf to buy it. Which means making impossible for anyone to get them. The players would think that they could get them but it would be impossible to do.

Seriously I was talking about the point of being told before the fact. In closed beta the devs took the common IO's off of the tables and made them recipes only attainable in drops. Next they put them back on the table along with drops. The devs must have known that those common IO's would cause the costume drop rate to be much lower than normal. Heck they decided long before Positron's post that they wanted costume pieces to be commodities that we would be willing to pay top inf. for. This was decided on before it was reality.

I am talking about being told way ahead of time before it is reality. I am talking about telling players that do not visit the forums or post. If you were one of these players and saw the videos of I9 before live you may have had your eye teeth on tech wings for one of your toons. Then on live you find out the drop rate is so low that you may not ever see them.

I will illustrate. Let's say you have a good friend and one night you let him use your car to go get something. He does not go anywhere else other than where you send him too. He gets in an accident that is not his fault. What would you do if he came in and did not tell you that your car was damaged but found out the next day as you were going to work? You might be mad at him. What if he told you that while his was coming home he got in an accident and it was not his fault, giving you all of the details. Hiding things from people (players) makes it worst than openly telling them. That is the point I am trying to make. I am not talking about learning something here on the forums after the fact.