Kinslayer_

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- It's a much more suitable blaster tactic as they have higher damage.
- Corruptors main strengths are their buffs/debuffs. Kinetics need to be in close to make the most of these so you need a travel power that is VERY mobile and fly is the slowest of the lot. Chances are you'll swoop in and not get away in time on most occasions

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I was under the impression that villainous archetypes do more damage then their heroic counterparts who have greater defenses?

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No, the damage cap for a Corruptor is much lower than a blaster(75% rings a bell?)

I tend to look at Corruptors as closer to Defenders than blasters. Imagine a defender with weaker buffs/debuffs but stronger damage and thats probably closer to a CoH AT than a Blaster

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It felt so wrong killing the poor squishies again and again ......

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lol, send them to me for advice. I was the only squishy against two stalkers and a spine regen and got comments on my play.

Not on how good I was but on how much of a cowardly runner I was

Cowardly running FTW!

First off, really enjoyed both my matches.

Thanks to the guys I teamed with and against(both in the case of divinedarkness as I fought then allied with her )

Apologies to Blindfaith in the second as we mercilessly made her priority target

Big thanks to Israfel, Awn and Blindfaith though for allowing us to restart after the first DC.

Also, thanks to xanthus and Cap Morgan for arranging ti. The random teaming wasn't as tough as it could have been and showed it is more down to skill and teamwork than builds. Thought I was in for a definite ganking in the second as the only squishy with all those AS's and spines going around and went from cursing the draw to realising almost any three can win with the right tactics and teamwork

Here's looking forward to weak two!

Just thought I'd set this up so we can all discuss the first week of the Union matches.

He he he, already sent him a PM Max. I'm going to put my katan/regen scrapper in their SG and have offered to let them use Last Legion Of Destruction as the villain half

OK, never really given my PB or WS much of a run out and they are both sitting around the level 15 mark so thought I'd pop in here for advice.

First off, I don't like the nova form. I've pretty much decided I will be going human/dwarf form and ignoring nova altogether. Will also be going for a team build rather than a solo one.

That in mind, are there any dwarf/human builds out there and any play tips in general? (too lazy to go through working one out myself )

Would also be nice if it had a PvP edge to it.

Well, I think you, me, Max and kosmos gives us 4 players who will probably be up for it.

In terms of AT's, Max should definitely take his stalker I think and, as it's on test, I can respec my lvl fire/therm purely for PvP over there or take Exo.

Pretty sure we can get one or two of the other regulars along as well.

Phil is right about the pools in that you seem to have taken 5

Leadership(assault, tactics)
Leaping(combat jump)
Speed(hasten)
Fitness(hurdle, health, stamina)
Flight(air superiority, fly)

Not sure what version of hero planner you used but you may want to check it's not broken as you can only have four pools

TBH, I wouldn't even look at air superiority and fly. Fly is pretty slow and there are a lot of -FLY powers in the game. Coupled with the fact you have no knockback resistance, I'd swap them out for SJ and acrobatics, just putting an end reduction in each. Dropping hover as well will then allow you to take the SB Phil has mentioned.

That will then free up 5 slots to be used a lot more effectively elsewhere.

Personally, all my PvP squishy builds have both SS and SJ factored in. If you get a toggle dropped and it's SJ, you've got no chance of escaping danger.

6 slot freeze ray. You have no idea how useful this power is in PvP and on my Ice/Ice, it's probably responsible for 80% of my kills, even if it means takign the slots from your other attacks. 2 accuracy, 3 hold and a recharge or end reduction is the way to go.

Swap health for swift. The bonus from health is non existant but that extra bit of mobility can be very helpful.

You also need to look at your build in terms of level. Below level 30, there seem to be a few key ommissions, such as hasten not being 3 slotted until after, meaning Sirens will be tough for you.

I can't comment on the kinetic side as I've never played one but if you were to ask me must have primary and pool powers, here's what I would go for. I'd fit all of these in before or on lvl 30

Ice blast
Ice bolt
Freeze ray
Aim
Combat jumping
Super jump
Swift
Hurdle
Stamina
Bitter ice blast
Hasten
Super speed
Acrobatics

That will leave you with 6 powers from your secondary(or a 4th pool). The main problem is only three of those will be available before lvl 30, which is a bit of a pain so if there is a 4th you want, look at squeezing aim or ice bolt in later.

The 6 powers left would probably be

Transfusion
Siphon Speed
Siphon Power
Transference
Fulcrum Shift
Speed Boost

You can then fit tactics in later on if you really want it(though I'd go with stealth). The only PvP power from your Patron pool I'd look at is the hold. Power sink from Scirroco's can be useful but not necessary as a kinetic.
There are also several other threads with Ice/Kin discussions in so my be worth looking at those(first two are more useful as they have PvP considerations)

HERE
HERE
HERE

I can uinderstand the tactics on Corruptors hovering over the fight and taking the 'opportunity' shots but there are a few problems with this.

- It works a lot better with a 'stealth' power
- It's a much more suitable blaster tactic as they have higher damage.
- Corruptors main strengths are their buffs/debuffs. Kinetics need to be in close to make the most of these so you need a travel power that is VERY mobile and fly is the slowest of the lot. Chances are you'll swoop in and not get away in time on most occasions

A Dom is definitely next on my list for a PvP alt, just to combat the complete lack of them.

I have a lvl 18 plant/thorn so as soon as Exo get's his last two levels, I'll start PL'ing the Dom before I7 and fit some extra levels in when possible after I7.

As for picking some of the best players to put together viable PvP teams, I think that is the next step. The 'Wednesday Night PvP Fun' on test, mentioned HERE is definitely going to get me along from next week.

I think we've had enough weeks of theory and practice now to give us ideas of what works and what doesn't so testing them out against these guys will be the next step.

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the only AT that should be able to stalkstalkers, is another stalker!

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So, where would the balance in Hero V Villain PvP zones come from. You're essentially saying stalkers should be able to walk all over them without any risk of detection until they decide too attack? Too one sided.

I don't like the fact that playing against stalkers is an 'all or nothing' approach, if you have the +PER to see them, they're easy pickings, if you don't there's almost nothing you can do to combat them.

Personally, I would like to see a more 'random' approach to spotting hidden/stealth/invised characters. As I understand it, the difference between a players stealth rating and the oppositions perception gives a kind of 'distance to be seen' rating. This is why stealthed characters can be seen up close but disappear when they move away.

The biggest problem playing as or against a stalker is you can either see them, or you can't, depending on your perception against their stealth rating. This means a stalker can either kill you with impunity or you can completely disable his main AT strength, leading to frustration on both sides.

What frustrates people is that there is nothing they can really do about this so some sort of 'luck' should be factored in, in exactly the same way as 'luck' is used when seeing if you hit or miss.

For me, this rigid method is too easy to counter and needs to be more flexible. What I would like to see is a 95% cap on ALL stealth powers and some sort of random check carried out every few seconds that results in a character being viewable for a limited time before the check is made again.

So the figures would look something like this

No stealth powers at all - 0% stealth
Super Speed - 15% stealth
Stealth, arctic fog, etc - 30% stealth
Grant Invisibility - 65%
Invisibility - 70% stealth
Superior Invisibility/Hide - 75% stealth

Random Stealth Bonus(RSB) - 0-20%

The check could then be made every 5 seconds or so to see what the RSB is for the next 'cycle' and combined with your stealth bonus from powers to give you a 'Stealth Rating' for the next cycle. for example:

Stalker with hide gets a 16 RSB and that goes on his Hide to give him a 'Stealth Rating' of 91 for that cycle. That then means ANYONE, regardless of their perception, has an 8% chance of seeing the stalker for the next 5 seconds.

Those with perception bonuses, would have a slightly higher chance so a table of bonuses for those would have to be drawn up.

Tactics - 10%
Small Yellow Insp - 3%
Medium Yellow Insp - 5%
Large Yellow Insp - 8%

So, on the above example, somone running tactics would have an 18% chance of seeing the stalker.

What this means is that with hide, a stalker would have to get the full 20 RSB to reach the cap but by taking stealth, the RSB will be meaningless as you'll be at it anyway.

Obviously, there are flaws in this. Even someone without +PER will see a stalker at the cap once every 20 cycles (one minute 40 seconds), meaning if you have 2 toons in the area, one of them will 'see' the stalker every 50 seconds, if there are 4, one will spot him every 25 seconds and so on. In a busy zone that will cause problems, especially if tactics is in play.

I don't see that as a flaw in the idea, it just means a lot of datamining and testing would be needed to get the figures right so it works.

Playing a stalker against someone with tactics you just avoid them if possible as they can see you and there's nothing you can do. Playing someone who can't see a stalker is just frustrating as, again, there is nothing you can do.

Introducing some sort of randomness is definitely the way forward IMO becuase:

- It still gives stalkers and other invised characters a big advantage

- It makes characters without perception feel they actually have a chance to stop getting AS'd, albeit a slim one

- It gives stalkers a chance to still use stealth against high perception characters

Now, before people tear the idea apart at the seams, it's JUST AN IDEA! I'm not anumber cruncher, I don't have the game mechanics memorised and this is just a rough idea to give an example of a possible solution. What I'm trying to illustrate is that ALL characters should have a small chance to see stalkers and all stalkers should have a chance to remain invisible against high perception toons.

What I would like to see is a few of the more technical and imaginative people out there coming up with a better method of using stealth/perception so, like accuracy, it's a bit more random.

Tuesday night is also CoV arena night on Union.

Primarily to try out different tactics and practice but we sometimes have some heroes taking part resulting in a few battles.

Just a quick note that I'll have to pop off around 20.00 for up to half an hour.

Got a friend who's half a bar from 50 and promised I'd be there for the ding

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Sure i can make it i will join u with my C0rp0ral Punishment, and what is 3VP

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The huge cross server PvP tournament that's been plastered all over the Union/Defiant/PvP forums for the last few weeks and has just under 100 people taking part

Check the PvP forum for full details.

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Hmm definetly a worrying number of heroes, ahh well no matter more rep then for me .

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Yup. Judging by response on the Villain thread, this may well turn into a gank fest

I'll try to encourage my SG/VG guys to play as their villains.

Not sure how much luck I will have though as fighting on the risk free side or getting ganked on the outnumbered side seems a bit of a no brainer.

I'll be staying on the villain side throughout, no matter how bad things are though.

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Well, with 2/3 good hits, my buddy standing over me has a far better chance of Pwning you

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It's going to be a cold day in hell before 2/3 brawls drop enough toggles to make a difference with the toggle drop changes.

As an Ice/* Corruptor, if someone got in close enough to brawl I'd either be running, holding or attacking with a normal power.

Relying on a low damage attack with a 5% chance to toggle drop if it hits is not my idea of a viable tactic. I'd rather turn all my toggles off and hold a sing up saying 'shoot me'

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From my limited experience of fire leave out Flares and Rain of Fire both terrible powers

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Yup

Flares - Sucks big time. Can be useful early on to get an attack chain going but the damage on it is so feeble you won't use it to any worthwhile effect past lvl 20.

Fire Blast - Great for a level one power and well worth spending a few slots on. low end cost, reasonable damage and quick recharge.

Blaze - Your highest damaging 'standard' attack. Short range but as a kinetic, you'll be in the middle of the action enyway.

Fireball - Mixed views from me. High damage but the AoE makes it a bit of an aggro magnet.

Aim - Great power, 3 slot for recharge.

Rain Of Fire - Scatters mobs and gets you aggro for feeble damage. Can be useful in very specific teams, where you can stack it with things like Ice Storm and AoE holds but way too situational to be taken over any of the other powers in the set.

Blazing Bolt - Very good for solo play as a buildup and snipe will let you hurt one target massively before they know what's happening. Depends on playstyle though.

Fire Breath - Good damage and a cone attack meaning you can get a few in it. Slow animation though.

Inferno - Best. Nova. In. The. Game Damage output on it is great and mines available every 2-3 mobs in a mission for mass kills.

Think that covers them all but can't remember.

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Can we bet on the results? I bet a couple of mill inf on team6 first round, and team 13 second round.

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13 seems to be a lucky number for both rounds, looking at the round two team and recognising them all as good players in the PvP zones.

Without a doubt, he made a huge difference for me. When we had the 2 on 2 against the kinetics, during the whole 10 minute fight, I think I had 2 'gaps' in Thaw and the slow effect of the kins was a killer.

Also, when I was 'forged' it was pretty noticeable. I have three attacks, Ice Bolt, Ice Blast and Bitter Freeze Ray and when I wasn't forged, I pretty much had to hit all 3 of them twice for the kill. With Forge, one chain was enough.

Difference in that fight was definitely the mez protection. Movement overall was good and I think without a hold, none of us would have really died because of the heals so Venador not being able to ID Kosmos was pretty much the decider. Would have also been interesting if one of the two kins had a hold as it would have boiled down to which team could hold and kill the non mez protected Corruptor the most.

Not having some form of heal does make me a little less effective as a Corruptor so I'll definitely be dropping stealth for Frostwork when we get our free I7 respec.

In one of the team PvP battles(was on the Skyway or Steel map), the team I was on got pwned due to a complete lack of team work. The blaster ran off as soon as the battle started, before he'd even been buffed some followed and some hung back meaning the team was badly spread out. As we were dying, people were going back to the fight one at a time and being killed, rather than taking a timeout to regroup. There was also a lot of enemy target debuffing going on but the damage dealers were ignoring the targets being called out.

Nitro and me regrouped away from the fight at one point and called everyone to us but were largely ignored which was a real shame. Two of the other team, Spine Shooter and Icy Thunder stumbled across us and must have been rubbing their hands in glee at the squishy MM and Corruptor. 30 seconds later they were both dead thanks to the the deathtraps Nitro had set up

There are definite teamwork issues with some of the new players which need to be ironed out, most of it is down to impatience. Teams NEED to have a target caller and that person has to have a bind set up. Another bind that may be bery useful is to warn of stalkers. I got AS'd a couple of times by ones I couldn't see but other team members could so a single 'stalker incoming' may be useful.

Ahh, my favourite build in the entire game and CoV's greatest 'team player'

First stop, slotting. TBH, looks pretty much spot on to me, though there are a few you can probably free up. The single end reductions in your shields are going to have a minimal/non existant effect on your end. Even bubbling a full team of 8 will see very little difference in end saved by slotting them. + 2 slots

I'm guessing Inferno is purely a PvE power for the build but you will need an accuracy in there. Even with 1 accuracy and aim, I regularly miss mobs. I would drop one of the recharges for it.

The two to hit buffs in aim are OK but you just need to think if those two can be used elsewhere to more effect? + 2 slots

Triple slotting of heat exhaustion? I guess you really don't want it to miss in PvP as recharge is quite long but think I'd have slotted something else. Worth noting that for PvP, you're going to be relied on mainly for Thaw/Heals/Shields so can be forgiven for skimping a little on the debuffs. +1 slot

So, we have a total of 5 slots to play with now. I'd look at sticking all of these in toggles as end reductions. These are verey picky re-slots though so aren't going to make a huge difference, more about fine tuning.

Only real question with power selection is in relation to your PPP. No 'Power Sink' from the Scirrocco set? I have a lvl 40 fire/therm and lvl 38 ice/ice and both will be going for that as a must have power.

Just by sticking to your Thaw/Heals/Shields, you will chew end like there's no tomorrow. Not a problem for bursts of activity in PvP zones but for arena where you have almost no down time, this will be a problem.

Overall, there is very little wrong with the build and most of what I've suggested is personal taste.

I love playing my fire/thermal even though he can't solo. With no real healer in CoV, he makes a big difference to brute heavy teams in keeping them kicking

Those of you wanting some practice before Thrusday's matches, We have the weekly PvP practice night on CoV at 19.30 Tuesday in Port Oakes arena, ruby zone.

Feel free to turn up and make the most of it

It's still ongoing

We try to get as many people as possible along, regardless of PvP experience. It's a good chance for people getting into PvP to come for advice as well as we have a little chat after each match to decide what worked and what didn't.

On a related not, I'll be there from 19.30 tomorrow and am hoping for a good turnout as it's last practice session before thw 3vP tournament.

If you can round up your team mates for first round and want to practice, bring them along

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Group Name
The European Villainous Immorality League (EVIL)

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Just tried it and working fine for me
The url for your web page doesn't work. Either that or my browser is buggy as hell.

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Just out of interest, why do people think there's more to the hive than just Hamidon?

I've had a look round there several times thanks and have yet to see anything that suggests something special there.

The fact the game is 2 years old now and there are so many servers in the US, I'd have thought something would have been found by now or at least enough evidence found to suggest something that there would have been a huge buzz about it, like there was with Caleb.

As for the Dev's refusing to confirm or deny anything and making Cryptic remarks, look at the Caleb incident. They refused to admit it was bugged and claimed 'it woul take a concerted effort', 'look for the clues' etc. Several different and convoluted strategies were tried then they amditted there was a bug and fixed. The solution to that 'great mystery' and 'challenging spawn method'? Just spend 20 minutes or so killing a few demons on Thorn Isle.

Other than the Jell-o in the middle, I suspect the only other thing of interest there is the Giant Monster 'Red Herring'

Hmm, I think someone has incorrectly been given the 'God of PvE' award on Union.

Methinks White Death should be taking them to court and challenging under the trade descriptions act

I really should stop deleting builds when they get in the 30's or just leaving them to rot at the late 40's as posts like this just make me feel inferior when I think of how much I play the game

Done and dusted. Also managed to get out of the final room with most of the team still alive