Primal

I just happened to be on both tonight, 8-9:45ish Eastern, and for own enlightenment I took various looks at the number of people (unhidden) in Atlas, then Kings Row.

Freedom Atlas: 160-180
Freedom KR: 12-14

Virtue Atlas: 120-140
Virtue KR: 9-10

Now, were all those people PLing and Farming? Doubt it. Does this mean anything? Shrugs. There always have been lots of people in Atlas, hanging around.

Yep and yep. Very rarely I'll kick it up, but I'm here to smack things down, not mess around with them. Even my Scrappers, Brutes, and MMs. One of the best things about I16 is the new ability to set things at -1, hopefully in large amounts too. I don't really care much about getting through levels fast.

I have one on Virtue, level 42. I'm the only one I've ever seen, actually don't see much AR at all these days, no idea why.

I saw you in the thread, which is why I hastened to add I'd see some here.

I have a Bots/TA that's working out pretty well. Safe as can be, actually it's really boring, but she's only 18. I fully expect to be a murder machine with OSA + AssBot.

I have a Gravity/Ice at 50. I'm the only one I'VE ever seen too. I recall a fair number of people posting about how they were going to roll a MA/Fire, but I've seen people post a whole lot of things that didn't actually translate into reality. I've never seen any of them actually in the game. (Geez, just where is everybody? This is becoming a theme.)

I had a Gravity/TA, made right after the Containment changes. Wow, I felt overpowered actually, I was taking down Bosses with ease, everything just seemed to flow together.

It's interesting you mention Fallout 3 - and correct me if I'm misunderstanding what you're saying here - as an example of exploration done badly. I consider that game and Oblivion to be excellent places to just wander around in, as though neither world is all that large there are plenty of things to look at just for the sheer sake of seeing them. The Capital Wasteland does lack snow-covered areas and other variety of terrain, but otherwise there are lots of areas to poke around in which might or might not have some sort of "point". To me, exploring an area should occasionally take cues from real life, and have nothing there but scenery.

I agree that Paragon City and the Rogue Isles are not particularly interesting places to explore, by and large. There are exceptions here and there, Oro and the Shadow Shard, and other places mentioned in that thread started by Dark_Respite. But the world isn't really intended for that either; as I'm sure has been pointed out, this game is not the same kind of world, it's basically like...well, a lot of console RPGs come to mind, as there are usually world maps you can travel around on, but the actual content is all within the named areas. CHV thinks like that, on a smaller scale than EQ, FFXI, etc. It's not quite as simple as just adding a new map.

Regarding the emphasis on rewards, I feel the game has changed a lot since a few issues ago, and to me it's not for the better. Or maybe I should say, the rewards themselves have changed, and the game followed suit. Doom? No, quite the contrary actually, lots of people are much happier I'm sure. Eh, maybe I'm just burned out, or projecting, there's just so little...spark, magic, passion, any more.

Same here in Georgia, was nasty Sunday, but obviously was getting better Monday and it's just fine now. Some Windows update came through yesterday, dunno if that was just coincidence.

I have a Hero who plants bombs.

Man I wish we had detonate-at-will bombs in this game, plantable on environment or enemies.

Well, you still have to give somewhat of a crap, but a Regen Scrapper is not a bad choice at all. Status protection they have, as long as you don't aggro a roomfull at once, and as long as you follow a couple of rules you can handle them just fine. Carry a couple of break-frees and blues just in case. First rule: if there's a Sapper, rush that bastage with whatever build-up type power you have and take him out, preferably in a single shot or involving a knock-down. (My MA/Regen had that hold from Darkness Mastery too, which was SO very helpful. That plus Crane Kick = dead Sapper.) Second rule: some Titans (Hercules and Zeus) have -regen in their missiles, so ideally you can just pop into melee, but at the very least you want to rush them too. I actually rather enjoyed Malta missions with my main, it was fun sneaking up on Sappers and Titans using available cover.

Carnies are not a problem for a Regen. The only thing to beware of is killing off a bunch at once, but that's something every non-defense character would want to avoid anyway.

Edited: Yeah, Hercules and Zeus Titans get a Plasma Blast that's -regen. Obviously that's something a Regen is going to want to avoid. They only do that at range though, get right in their faces.

My Gravity/Ice Dominator (back before the buff) did fine, mainly because I had read about them ahead of time here on the forums and knew to keep them the heck out of melee. Some people like to say that a Dom HAS to be in melee, but she's always tended to stay at range, so she didn't have much problem. Hold 'em all, pick them off, spamming holds as necessary. If all else fails, hide in the Singularity. I saved Domination for the Wizard (purple-conned), and he never got off a shot.

There's one mission where you're not only facing Vanguard, but a prior ally as well (details omitted to avoid spoilers), and he had a bugged habit at the time of spawning as a full-on Hero, the 32k+ hp high-damage type, no matter what difficulty or team size. He is hostile to the Vanguard. The three Vanguard he was facing took him down to HALF HIS HEALTH before he won. Sadly I knew I wasn't prepared for a Hero fight even with "only" that much hp, so I had to reset the mission.