Johnny_Butane

I got crap for being who I am.
As opposed to trying to pretend to be something I'm not (and make money off of it).

If I had been trying to convince the jocks I was a football star in order to score with cheerleaders when I couldn't play for crap, then the situation would be comparable.


So, all I've said is I don't care for Day's work and I think her gamer image is manufactured and that constitutes bullying now?

I don't ever recall stuffing her or anyone else into a locker for not being gamer enough.


@Hyperstrike
Man, my handlers never page me when I'm appearing as a guest at cons. Do yours when you do? If they did I'd probably just leave the phone in my Lamborghini.



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Maybe it's the fact that people who aren't geeks and gamers have co-opted the culture to make money. Stuff like "Gamer Fuel" Mountain Dew and models who wouldn't know Samus from B.J. Blazkowicz who pose for skanky photos licking controllers. ****ing Usher performing at E3.

When I was in high school, my friends and I used to have people trying to kick the sh out of us every day because we played computer games. We were harassed constantly. When using the internet was a social stigma, we were the outcasts but we took our lumps and called ourselves geeks as a point of pride.

Now that gaming is "cool", when actors or rappers go on about how huge gamers they are for playing Halo a couple of times or having run a raid in WoW, I can understand real geeks and gamers who who cringe at that. Like I said before, most are as legitimate as Vanilla Ice's street cred.

IMO, being a gamer is like Woodstock; if everyone who claimed they were there had been there, they would have needed 10 fields. If everyone who claimed they are obsessive gamers was one, high school computer labs from the 80's and 90's would have been overflowing with people elbow to elbow and today there wouldn't been a free slot on any game server anywhere.



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Which is part of her image. That's why it is, as you put it, so "well documented". Has she played WoW? Probably, but casually. Not "obsessively". I'd be surprised if she had a character over 40 that wasn't PLed or someone played for her.

No, it originated when her agent worked out a deal with Bioware for her to do some promotional work for the game.

In parallel universe where Bethesda's phone wasn't busy that day, she starred in an Elder Scrolls web series instead and tells everyone at the cons how much she plays Skyrim (and pronounces it 'scrim').




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Actually, people are just taking for granted that they are.

The only thing the devs said was that Tankers would be the next AT "looked at".
That doesn't necessarily mean they're looking at them to buff or improve them.

Considering the AT's track record, I wouldn't be surprised if some mechanic they cook up doesn't find it's way to Scrappers or a brand new AT instead, a la Fury.


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This I don't disagree with.

You'll need to clarify what you mean by "performance-wise they are similar". Do you mean currently you think Tankers, Brutes and Scrappers are similar performance-wise or do you suggesting that the unique playstyle they'd carve out would give them similar performance?

The former, I assure you many players would disagree with, myself vehemently, and the latter I don't think will happen with the suggestions you make further down.


My interest in this is exactly zero. All of my Tankers have their endurance problems solved by the mid 30s, except for a few of the more extreme sets and combos, which seems completely fair and acceptable to me.

If ALL Scrappers, Brutes and Tankers were currently facing dire endurance woes that seriously hindered their ability to fight, then I could maybe get behind a suggestion like this. But that's not the situation. The situation is that they're not, that blue inspirations exist and that there are already powers like Consume, Conserve Power and Energize and you're doing me no great service by making them more 'skippable' and less meaningful by handing out end discounts to everyone that I don't think are even needed.

It also comes back to what the devs said in the coffee talk about "fun". I have a hard time seeing anyone playing a Tank and going "Oh man! I'm discounting so much end right now! Woot!" If people wont play Tankers because the perception is that they're slow, boring, and low damage now, then slow, boring, low damage with a full blue bar isn't going to sell them on the AT.

Which is similar to what I suggested earlier with Taunt granting the Tanker and people close to them some Absorb. Again, I say, I'd get behind stuff like this provided a 145% increase to the Tanker damage cap is also part of the deal.


Ultimately, as long as the damage cap gets fixed, I don't really mind what Tankers get, but, I would think it needs to be flashy and add some pizzazz to the AT. Something that makes people think Tankers are badass (and I'd be hard pressed to call ineffectual decoys/turtles, even ones with boundless endurance, badass). I'd also have to insist that whatever Tankers get is a boon to Tankers, as opposed to a boon to everyone else; ie, everyone BUT the Tanker are the ones really benefiting. Otherwise it's like the d-bag who gives you a "present" of donating a dollar to a charity in your name for your birthday gift.


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You say 'they' as if it has always been the same people. People come, people go. A similar call that was made by someone once may not be made by whoever is in charge years later. Different philosophies, different POVs.

As was said even during that coffee talk: the devs currently don't want a DPS meter in game, but they know some people in the office would dig it. Years from now, one of those people could be in charge and overturn that decision. Energy Melee is a perfect example. Last time it was looked at, it was nerfed hard. Now the current guard is excitedly talking about improving it.

In other words, things change.



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Something like this came up during the coffee talk. I think, I'm not sure, it was regarding /Mental for Blasters and how Drain Psyche was already 'a little too good' and that's why Mental didn't get anything for the upcoming Blaster changes.

The sentiment that seemed to be expressed for things like that was they understand exactly that we know something's OP, but that their current stance is that since it's been that way for so long, it's not worth nerfing and causing a disruption and complaints. In other words, they're not above bumping other things up a little, but they're not currently out to cut down any tall poppies.



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445% from the current 300%, from my rough calculation, which could obviously be flawed. That, along with Bruising, would put Tanker single target damage at the cap to 90% of what a Brute would do at the cap. AoE damage would still lag behind, because Bruising really doesn't affect it, but considering Bruising has other advantages (buffing teammates/pets) that's an acceptable trade off in my opinion.

In that case I wouldn't object to what you're proposing.

I wouldn't object to it, but I'm not sure I'd ever use it.
Why would I as long as red inspirations don't enforce a survivability penalty?



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No, it doesn't because Brutes.

It's as simple as that.

Brutes have the same resistance caps as Tankers and just 10% shy the same Max HP caps. Fury doesn't suddenly shut off and their damage buff cap suddenly shrink when a Brute gets his survivability above a certain point. Brutes don't have to sacrifice or trade off so why should Tankers?



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This I mostly agree with, but even positioning mobs becomes trivial in the typical steamroll that happens nowadays.



Here is the problem, as I see it:

The more powerful every AT becomes, the safer they become and the less important tanking becomes. Most people agree it's better than the squishy ATs are not quite as squishy as they once were.

The state of the game isn't a bad one for everyone else, but it's not a good one for Tankers because of the one role they were designed to do.

Therefore they need to have their role expanded. Better than average survivability and being a distraction and the cost of having your offense crippled does not cut it anymore.

As other ATs become safer, it becomes more and more illogical to punish Tankers with having low damage when many of those other ATs can became safe and not have to give up their superior damage. If a Scrapper and a Brute can walk into the same mission solo as a Tanker and not die, why is the Tanker penalize to do it slower? Being tougher than a Scrapper or a Brute really isn't an advantage if Scrappers and Brutes aren't dropping dead to begin with and get to dish out much better damage.

And giving Tankers more control doesn't solve anything because much in the same way tanking has become less important, so has control. You don't need a tanker to help lock down a crowd with control if they're not a huge threat to anyone else to begin with and are being steamrolled over. And control does nothing for the Tanker when he's not on a team.

If people want a control/defense AT or a melee damage/buff-debuff AT then they should tell the devs they want one, but Tankers are not that. Like all melee ATs, Tankers were given a defense power set and a melee damage power set. Tankers hit things and Tankers get hit. If "getting hit" isn't doing it nowadays, it's time to re-examine how they hit things. People like Brutes more than Tankers because despite the fact share a lot of similarities, Brutes are tough but they don't hit like girls. People like damage. People like feeling powerful. That's exciting. 'Slow and steady' isn't widely regarded as fun and exciting. So if they can't make Tanker combat interesting and unique from Scrappers, Stalker or Brutes without Tankers being 'Fury-less Brutes', they need to put some more serious thought into it because I'm sure there's room for four flavors of melee fighter ATs without one being stuck with the "slow-and-weak-hitting-with-superfluous-survivability" flavor.



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How does making an AT that is already nigh unkillable even more nigh unkillable improve them in a meaningful way? Are people not playing Tankers because they die too much?

No. So why do they need to be tougher than they are when they're already the toughest?

And why do you think that if people aren't playing Tankers despite the fact that they're the toughest, that making them tougher will change their minds?


If by "more similar to Brutes" you mean popular and generally regarded as fun to play and not regarded as slow and boring, which is what seems to be the most common criticism about Tankers, then I don't think that's a bad thing.

Only if things like Fear and Confuse were huge problems for every other melee AT to begin with. They're not. They're rarely seen minor annoyances at worst, one not even shared uniformly by all power sets.

445% as opposed to the 300% it is currently.


Too griefable. No sensible person would ever turn on the toggle.

Counter suggestion: When a Tanker uses Taunt, he radiates a power to nearby teamates that grants them and the Tanker a small amount of Absorb. Does not stack, even from two different Tankers, but further taunting will refresh it.

Gives Tankers a reason to take Taunt for themselves, especially in the lower levels (because survival in the lower levels isn't as assured for a Tanker) and use it even when solo.



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Higher damage resistance caps are unlikely to happen. At the existing caps, a well build Tanker can already survive pretty much anything in the game that CAN be resisted. More survivability is simply the last thing Tankers need.

Aggro caps can't be changed depending on AT. They are a fixed value in the AI for everyone. Even if they could be, or with a workaround like invisible pseudopets, increasing aggro caps for Tankers actually makes additional Tankers less desirable for a team. The only reason to have more than one Tank now is to deal with adds and spill over. Having one Tanker that can do that themselves means there's less reason to have another.

The Tanker HP Cap, for the same reasons as the resistance caps, is also about as high as it ever should be. The best you could hope for is some Absorb given to Tankers inherently to help mitigate unresistable damage and such. But that is something they probably still don't need because the people who aren't playing Tankers aren't playing them because they lack survivability.

I have seen nobody, not one person, who seriously thinks that Tankers aren't tough enough. What I have seen, especially from people who don't play them, are numerous complaints and comments that Tankers are too slow, are boring and they lack damage. If one truly wants to make Tankers more popular, more fun for all players to play instead of just for the diehard niche fans of the AT, ignoring those complaints would be folly. Because everyone else isn't buying the 'extra-survivability-plus-aggro-control-at-the-cost-of-all-else' that the Tanker AT is currently selling.



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If they make Tanker changes, whatever they do, I hope that it's actually for Tankers.

Because the "Blaster changes" announced yesterday are mostly not about Blasters, but all of the ranged damage sets.

So the "Tanker changes" better not amount to shuffling around stuff for all the melee ATs and every two-bit Assault/Manipulation set that gets some of the same melee attacks.


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Not to go off topic, but I'd love to see Talos get a revamp to include a real Chinatown. Maybe clear out some of the warehouses or generic buildings around the Science Store area.


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Being a street level hero has nothing to do with whether your level 1 or level 41. Batman is a street level hero. Daredevil is a street level hero. Both of them are on different power levels. Batman didn't leave Gotham City when he became an accomplished crime fighter, and frankly I think we could use some "street level" zones for level 50 heroes, as well as zones suited for other types of characters.

Not everyone is a Dr. Strange (Dark Astoria) or an Avenger (RWZ) or Spartacus (Cimerora). We need zones to cater to all kinds of level 50s; street level dark crusaders, super agent spy guys, scientific challengers of the fantastic, high flying steel men of tomorrow, cosmic ring powered surfing space knights, etc.

Sure, new zones for them are preferable. But revamping existing zones, as with Dark Astoria, is more economic and easier to pull off. If there's a superfluous zone of that kind at a lower level range, why not re-purpose it for a higher level range?


Hence why we revamp it with new stories and different enemy groups.

At present the zone only has Clockwork, The Lost and Trolls AFAIK. With the exception of the Lost, there's nothing exactly precluding those gangs from being in the high levels. For what it's worth, I think Supa Trolls should definitely be something high level heroes are in on; they're basically an army of mini-Hulks, after all. There's also not a lot tying those gangs to Skyway to begin with. So bringing in new enemy groups wouldn't be much of a loss.



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That accomplishes nothing to make Tankers more fun than they are now. Tankers can already stand up to AVs.

At the same time you're nerfing all the other ATs so they'll take more damage against AVs.

Tankers causing people's Brutes and Scrappers, and all other ATs, to be nerfed is sure going to make people like Tankers then. /sarcasm

Plus, Marked for Death and death patches are the only things keeping me from nodding off playing my Tanker since there is literally no threat from anything else. If you make a Tanker able to ignore them, why have a human playing the Tanker at all? Just dual box a taunt bot. TANKERS DO NOT NEED MORE SURVIVABILITY.


"Not faceplanting" is not a unique mechanic.



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Tankers were designed for a game that no longer exists.



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I'm not entirely convinced yet there are any "aliens".





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