Johnny_Butane

Not before he is tagged with a radio transmitter so we can study his migration habits.

Turns out he just goes back and forth between the Wentworths in Atlas Park and the AE building.



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We're not going to get that. Ever.

We're going to have groups of 'demigods' ganging up on man-sized L54(+8) AVs, dodging colored near-instakill patches on the ground and ultra mag holds that ignore your mez protection and unresistable damage, probably coming from a stone hurled by a civilian in a business suit.

Forget about ramming a tank through a dropship, let alone even fighting one with less than 30 people. We're not allowed to be that cool. Remember Rikti raids? Their tiny dropships aren't even fazed by an Incarnate, so why would the Battalion be weaker?

About the only thing similar we can expect is when Star Sapphire gets one-shotted in the back and when Atomic Skull messes around instead of doing his job in the trial.


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Saving your own skin and making sure someone else doesn't takeover/destroy the world isn't exactly heroic.

In the case of the ITF, it's in your best interests NOT to let the timeline get too effed up, otherwise you may stop existing. Plus, as Imperious says, it's a fine excuse to spill some blood.

Lastly, he's indebted to you. Being owed a favor can be a very valuable thing, not to mention the Roman armor you get from the deal, which you can flip in the present for quick cash.

I'm sorry, but I fail to find a problem in this for any of my villains and their varied motivations. It's always a fun time beating down some primitive screwheads.



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I was going to suggest you getting this proc over in the other thread. 20% to psi will help a bit.


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I have no issue with Batman slipping on those electric brass knuckles like he did in JLU to trade punches with Parademons.

I've used this example before:

When non-super Captain America downs a Frost Giant with just his wits and his shield, that just shows how badass he is. Nobody questions it.

But when you have Thor get taken out by a shot to the chest by a Luger P08, that is wrong.


The point is, they should aim high for their content, not cater to the lowest common denominator. If you don't want your street level vigilante fighting giant robots, don't. Opt out of becoming a god and never unlock your Alpha. But FFS, don't have demigods getting beaned by sticks and stones.


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I disagree.

If anything, I proves my point about Tankers.

"Sure, give them 20% res to everything. It's not like they're going to do anything serious, they're already nigh unkillable. They're not suddenly going to start soloing Hamidon with it."

Look, ATOs are probably something most people will only do for their most important characters and their mains. My main Tank doesn't get killed by anything that's affected by damage resistance anyways, and besides he gets capped resistance to everything but Psi with Unstoppable already.

The procs for Brutes, Scrappers and Stalkers help them out considerably regardless of build or power set combo, so I consider the Tanker proc the lame duck of the bunch. You're going to get a lot less out of it depending on your primary, and that's bogus IMO.

And don't drag thematics into it. Even Controllers got a damage proc and they're not about damage either. They're even less about damage than Tankers, they don't have a damage primary or secondary.

I see it as Tankers being told, yet again, "here's your shiny beads and $24, GTF back in your place".

I'm not surprised because we've known about this proc since last summer, but I am sure still not impressed by it regardless of the numbers.


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Each iteration of it is 5% res to all. It stacks up to three times. 3x5=15%.
Enhancing it with a Catalyst makes it 3x6.7=20.1%

I don't think it has a 100% proc rate. I remember it whiffing a couple of times. The duration on each stack isn't listed, but I count 20 Mississippi's.

Also, it looks like it's currently bugged. The standard version of the proc doesn't proc at all, ever. It works if you upgrade it to Superior though.



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Just that attack, which IMO is a little unfair because the Brute (and AFAIK Scrapper) one is global and not tied to the attack it's slotted in. The Stalker one, AFAIK, is tied to the attack though.

Personally, I tried it in Punch and then switched out to Haymaker for testing purposes.

It was not not hard to maintain stacked to max in either when attacking single targets.

It's a bit of a pain to juggle both it and Bruising if you have them on two different attacks, but mine is a special case because I can't slot the ATO/proc into Jab without a build revamp.


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Many are very vocal about their blatant hatred of Tankers. I don't see the same kind of outcry rallying against the proposed Stalker buffs. Only Tankers elicit the turnout of the same dozen or so players who show up to shout down any proposed improvements.

They've done so for years, even when Bruising was about to be added. They were dead set against anything like Bruising if it was proposed by a player, but the game didn't fall apart when Bruising was added. This suggests their fingers are not as much on the pulse of the devs and the opinions of the true majority of players as they may think.

I think the complaints that lead to Bruising are just as valid (and in some cases are the same) as the complaints fueling this thread and the targeted feedback thread. If the developers do indeed feel there are issues they can address and proceed to do so, I look forward to the haters being proven wrong. Again.


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5-15%?

Try upgrading it to Superior with an Enhancement Catalyst for a 20% max.


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Well you can't.
Rocks fall on everyones heads then you choke on spores.
The end.


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Bruce will never, ever be taken out by a rock to the head and have it stick. He's got something that's as good as Kryptonian-level resistance to damage; he's got plot armor. His batarangs will never miss their mark when it counts. He'll never get seriously tagged by a lucky bullet. Every tactic he pulls out of his butt will always work. He'll always shake off the mind control or poison or whatever. He's seldom wrong about anything and it's a blue moon he's ever caught with his pants down.

It's a common complaint that Superman is too powerful and nothing poses a danger to him. That applies to Batsauce as well. When his writing is at its worst, he's got a plan for whatever you throw at him and it will always work, even when it shouldn't. Bat Shark Repellant.


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Not to mention what must be thousands of Longbow operatives with that power set. Or Synapse who could zip her away from danger before anyone could blink. Or have Manticore call up Dark Watcher and his teleporting expertise; he's got no love for Statesman, but he's still a hero.


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Red side has gotten plenty of love for the past ten issues or so.

Let's take a stroll back in time, shall we?

Issue 21
Galaxy City destroyed. The heroes were all derp derp while Recluse knew it was coming and even prevented the heroes from knowing about it.


Issue 20
BAF: geared towards villains. Killing mental patients isn't heroic. We must be killing them because they are explicitly not able to be controlled or contained.

Mortimer Kal Strike Force: Gives villains a perma-temp power and a Notice of the Well.
Heroes Sutter TF version gives them jack squat.


Issue 19
Vincent Ross' arc has you being powered up and taking on an army of heroes.
The counterpart hero arc clearly had less work put into it, no temp power and a recycled Faultline villain brought back to show heroes failed at bringing him to justice in the first place.


Issue 18
Fort Trident and the Crucible added. The villain's Crucible is a populated, cool looking map full of Easter eggs and in jokes where villains are praised by the NPCs. Trident is a stark Longbow base where heroes get to watch the Freedom Phalanx quarrel.
Winner: Villains


Issue 17
Villains get the clone epic with MacArthur and Silmon, arguably some of the best solo content in the game to that point.

Heroes get threatened and dissed by Agent Nance and his army of ninjas. Until the rewrite where he became a passive aggressive sycophant. Again, the villain arcs introduced are arguably much superior to the counterpart hero arcs.


Issue 15
Reichsman TF: Villains get a cinematic in their TF and heroes get to clean up the villains' mess. Villains get to channel the power of the Inner Circle while heroes get a drawn out beat down on a sack of HP and a bunch of NPCs who logically have no place showing up to help Reichsy.


Issue 13
Cimmeroan arcs. Again, the arc is about villains going out an doing stuff while heroes are almost purely reactionary and are just there to clean up the mess. Villains get GW in a thong and heroes get Daedalus.


Issue 12
VEATs versus squids.
'NUFF SAID



Yeah, villains get no love, except that they've gotten the better deal whenever there's been comparable blue side content or feature added for the past 10 issues. Villains get the better arcs, they get better stories, they get more rewards and heroes get useless glowing lobsters.



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You're right, it doesn't matter. It would be stupid and irresponsible to ignore the effects of IOs because they have become a common sight. But the Brute pep squad insists we and the devs do so.

95% of the game ISN'T REICHSMAN.
Nor is it trials.

95% of the game includes soloing on +0X1
95% of the game includes braindead radio missions.
95% of the game includes street sweeping green con enemies for that matter.

In all of those situations, Tankers having survivability over Brutes or Scrappers is superfluous. There is a much much smaller percentage of situations in the entire game that it is not. Maybe it's not 5%, but it's a heck of a lot less than the damage gap and the damage potential gap between Brutes and Tankers. And, that percentage only gets smaller the more IOs, buffs and Incarnate abilities Brutes and Scrappers are permitted that improve their toughness.

Also, something you and others forget: Not all survivability is derived from your build numbers. The Tanker primary and Brute secondary aren't the only thing that keeps them upright.

They get a TON of mitigation from their attacks. Namely, killing things before they can hurt you and various secondary effects on the attacks. For example, a Brute Foot Stomp mitigates damage BETTER than a Tanker Foot Stomp. They both knock the enemies on their butts just as good as the other, but the Brute inflicts more damage and has a greater chance of killing them. Usually, Tankers don't have the edge here because the numbers are the same, or they favor the Brute because the Brute is outputting more of the ultimate form of mitigation; dead enemies can't hurt you.

The truth is, this pushes the actual survivability of Brutes closer to Tankers than looking at their defense, HP and resistance numbers would suggest.


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Your best "universe-shaking stuff" is mundanes armed with stones, un-targetable invincible guard towers, escaped mental patients and moldy War Walkers with bloated regeneration?

Yeah, you could do better.
Can you?



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I used to be an Incarnate like you, but then I took a rock in the knee.



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IOs and the Incarnate system "don't count" when it comes to AT issues.
That's the excuse Brute boosters have been regurgitating for years.
It's bogus shield they hide behind so they can keep being utterly broken.

It ignores the fact of what happens when you balance damage against survivability, but allow Brutes and Scrappers, who have the survivability bar pretty high to begin with compared to other ATs, to gain more survivability via IOs and Incarnates without any required decrease in damage. You lower the risk of danger they're in, but they keep their damage edge.

Damage versus survivability is a dumb axis to balance on anyways. More survivability only becomes useful to a point. Once you can take the damage from whatever you're fighting, more than that is redundant. Comparatively, increasing damage is always useful, and doesn't become redundant until you can one shot anything and everything (GMs, Hamidon, you name it).

That is a point unlikely for any character to ever reach.
But being tough enough to handle like, 95% of the game's content, and see no drawback from not being as tough as a Tanker, is a point much more easy to get to, and one Brutes and Scrappers often do get to, and will continue to get to more easily the more Incarnate abilities, IOs, team buffs and temp powers are added to the game.
That should NOT be ignored, regardless of if the game is or is not 'balanced around IOs'.


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This is more of the same problem that's plagued the game from day one. There's no sense of power progression, the devs insist making the mundane threatening to high level superheroes and common sense is tossed out.

At level 25 I can stand in front of an anti-aircraft turret and shrug it off, but guys with swords can still cut me up.

At level 50, they pit us against non-powered humans with guns and blue cowboy hats. Getting hit by someone with superhuman strength that's powerful enough to shake the earth by stomping their foot should turn them into a fine red mist with one punch, but we can't even knock them over half of the time.

An Incarnate 'demigod' gets taken out by a rock thrown by some clod.

And so on, and so on.
That is BULL****

The developers are unwilling to design suitable, cosmic scale threats for Incarnates, so they resort to cheating mechanics, uber-powerful guard towers, War Walkers with bloated HP and regeneration and irate grandmas throwing stones. And then they feed us baloney like Director 11 and I'm absolutely sick of it.

Listen, if Praetoria wants to win the war, just take whatever non-targetable, invincible, invisible weapon they have on the guard towers at the BAF, mount it on treads and roll it into Atlas Park.

I'm sorry, but the promise of Incarnates was to deliver us content worthy of demigods, but it's more of the same mentality that sends me against blue cowboys, but this time with added cheating mechanics and dodging of colorful puddles.


That's what I thought the whole point of making us Incarnate demigods, so we would be operating on a grander scale, but I guess the point was a drawn out, pointless 'war' with irate Praetorian citizen/sheep beaning us to death with rocks and having us run from BAF guard towers instead of smashing them to atoms with awesome might.


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Is it confirmed that's what she's there for?

She doesn't give the typical "you must own this episode or be VIP to run it" speech the other contacts did before their arcs launched.

If she is indeed the next SSA contact, the 'why' could be that Vanguard has gotten wind this is connected with Darrin Wade and by extension, Rularuu. Vanguard handles all external threats to Earth, Shadow Shard presumably included. It's not a stretch to think Infernia joined Vanguard and they assigned her to something not Rikti related, considering what she's been through.


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Since he 'died' once before, that could have attracted Mot's attention. Biting it the second time could have opened the door.

Either way, I'm more interested in what Recluse plans to do.
Remember that episode of Batman: TAS where a small time hood got a rep for 'killing' Batman, and it just made him a target for the Joker? I could see the same thing happening to whoever is the one to do in States.

Plus this changes the balance of power, unless Recluse gets taken out similarly. This very much should cause a push by every two-bit villain group looking to gain some ground while things are in upheaval. It could explain how the Tsoo return with a vengeance after being absent from the game since, what, the mid 20s levels?

Plus, sign me up for the few who hope Statesman does make an eventual return. Like his creator or not, he's the face of the game.

As an additional thought, with Hero 1 in Vanguard custody, a cure supposedly being worked on, could his return be imminent to fill the void for a powerhouse hero?
That assumes he wants to stick around Paragon City. I personally, wouldn't mind helping him out overseas and get a taste for what London is like in the CoH universe. Considering we only have gotten to see one city and a small cluster of islands, it's high time the rest of the world was explored.


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To create an analogy:

MLB Online. "The Worlds Most Popular Online Baseball Game".

It's not pigeonholing to want the rules of baseball accurate and the popular teams represented in your baseball MMO before the developers add a full hotdog stand business sim to the game.

Yes, hotdogs are sold at baseball games. No, baseball isn't about selling hotdogs.

And asking for several new brands of hotdogs to be added to the game on the 'MLB Online' forums should get you laughed out on your butt. The fact that it doesn't and that the title has been co-opted by business sim players and the developers have pushed aside the baseball fans in favor of them, speaks volumes to the failure of "MLB Online" as a baseball game.



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