PsychicKitty

Welll...

For DPS calculations that are actualy truthful....mew uses a program called: Hero Stats

It keeps track of that and kills and Kill ratios and numbers of things killed, exp gained, average exp gained etc, etc....can even graph it all.

<_<

Mew likes to play them all.....

Guess since mew has more of them then other Archtypes then Stalker would be first...

And The soldiers and widows last because mew cant seam to get motivated to play them for very long.

Actualy just wanted to let stalkers know.....

That personaly...mew isnt doing much on beta right now...becasue just no point

The only thing to test really for stalkers right now is the ICE armor set....and really....its just OK....it doesnt give that great of defenses mnor have any super clever Stalker-esque thing to it.....so mew just cant be bothered with that.

Did try out for a bit the new Energy Aura...it works...its about the same....has a heal though now.

Tried Stalker with Regen...and it was still frustrating...the damage resistance boot it gives isnt that big of a deal.

Ok i know this is bumping up this post...

Ok here is an update on this stuff if no one noticed...

NC soft store finaly took my orders on Saturday after noonish.....so i was able to get the nifty boster packs before they are sold as pieces only.

The RSS feed has been updated...wow...and actualy the link fromt he city of heroes site works...

The Link onthe NC soft page for RSS links is still linking to the old RSS feed.

Luckily mew didnt have to call support this time.

oh ho...that would explain central time though not that small window of being able to call them......so the accounting department and actual sales group is in texas......

>_>...

ok so could someone please fly a plane over to texas and make sure they are not all dead or something...

I go to the website.....log in.....go to the booster section....try to buy a booster and get the ill fated message:
We are currently unable to accept your order at this time. Please try again later or visit one of our retail partners.

Clicking on the retail partner link makes it go to the nc soft store page again......clikcing onthe images of hte retail partners at the bottom leds you to a going rogue game for 29.99$ those people dont sell anything but that.

sooo....
what is the deal?
been like this for days.

So they say they are discontinuing boosters on august 30th...yet we cant seam to buy them?

why the heck is there a message up to get them now if we cant buy them?

whats real funny is the support time....yep city of heroes is run on pacific time...yet you have to call them during a small window during central time...and only monday through friday...>_>

I detect someone was hit inthe head by a large iron bar a few too many times at NC soft...i suggest someone go and administer first aid.

I think this must be the case...due ot the broken links onthe NC soft web site....RSS feed not being updated for very long periods...the actual support communication via email literally sending you messages that tell you the message was incorrect and was not recieved....>_>...hmm what else...oh the support time frame.....my favorite sending an in game petition and getting an automated email...while the ingame window will tell you to wait for an email.....only differences between bug reports and petitions seams to be the wording onthe automated message.

heck i got an email telling me....:the response you gave was sent a non-normal way and
could not be processed....=O_O=

Another one told me....i didnt send a message between the reply lines...so it had instructions to tell me how to do it....along with an attachment.....it seams its own attachement makes the replying to the message in question not get accepted......if you get rid of the attachment and send the message is not accepted because its not a reply....<_<

sooo....if any developers or admins reads this....please go down to the support office...and make sure they are not all dead or something.....

You can have hover, combat jump and super speed all going at once.

I would recommend keeping the IO in the sprint as that power can be activated and used while hover, combat jump and super speed are all going.

This would allow you to increased the defense you get from combat jump and hover...which isnt alot but might help...might even be able to use a few defense invention sets in hover and combat jump as well for a few added things.

when i want to get alot of stealth i tend to use super speed and the concealment IO...sometimes i even add in stealth if it isnt working too well.

Hate to say this....but super speed is the only power i can think of that actualy decreases your threat level too.

And the silly part is its effective enough that if an enite team uses super speed and a stealth IO they actualy are msotly more ffective then a stalker....to a point that if 7 people on ateam have those and 1 person is astalker just using hide.....the aggro will go to the stalker....stalker threat level is 2...and picks up alot of aggro sometimes.

<_<...ok mew admits it...she plays stalkers alot....sooo...she knows all about irritating things or why she gets all the aggro.

I personaly am of the opinion that there should be no untyped damage.

Thats the reason players have powers called Invulnerability or Superior Reflexes or can use a force fields int he first place....players are not supposed to start as superman and work their way down to clark kent....they are supposed to evolve and progress. and eventulay if the devlopers wnat to really do it correctly have the characters retire or reach the end of their carreer in a way that makes them feel they accomplished something.

It makes me think the characters are suddenly complete idiots when they do trials like the Keyes Trial for example.

There you are a Tank with powers to help you survive a a nuclear blast yet you die stupidly from something your powers wont suddenly protect you from?!? Since when did damage resistance all not work?

You have learned to put force fields on others and to stop all forms of damage but for some reason you suddenly no longer can do that?!? Again since when does resistance to all not work anymore?

You specialize in avoiding damage with almost preternatural acuity. You even learned that there are basicaly three forms of damage to worry about....melee, ranged and area of effect....yet suddenly you cant avoid the damage pulses?!? yah so since when does you have the ability to dodge all stop working?

If anything the Keyes trial doesnt make you feel super....it makes you fell like a lemming.....might as well make a bot program to do the thing for you....since its all about trial and error with no actual skill involved.

The develoeprs just dont understand the forced build technique at all.
I mean thats the concept for most high end content in games whether they be table top or not...

To understand....thats where you force the players into some situation that may in fact seam like the keyes trial or make them super weak.....but....what is added is other play missions and adventures that offer ways to bypass that system.
In other words you are litteraly forcing the players to build immunities or ways to damage a target becasue the players will always want an easy way to do it.
Thus you can literaly put in a bunch of things...which players will strive to complete or do in order to reach that goal...you can even make players do old content they might have avoided before.

In this game...the developers for whatever reason dont have ways to bypass that untyped damage in the keyes trial right now....which is bad.....what they should do is have items or powers that can be gotten some differing way to allow the players to feel like they are accomplishing something....

Nothing makes players feel more accomplished then when they figure out how to beat something in a trivial fashion....and can then lord it over other players who have not done the same thing.

To give examples of players doing this currently look through the forums about people defeating archvillains solo or with a friend....or doing things super fast....the players in question went to the trouble to get nukes from some other place...or got temp powers to summon shivans from somewhere else....
Those are good examples of forced building....the developers exponentialy increased content by making players go to other content and completing it so they could do differing content more easily.

Heck i am shocked they dont let players use that crazy drainig power they get from the Kahn Task force use them to do things to the incarnate enemies they run into....that woould make alot of people start doing the Kahn Task force for that power.
They could also make those healing things fromthe terra volta reactor work to prevent damage during the keys trial or something.....ie. they would litteraly in a round about way force players to go to the terra volta trial to get items to use inthe game later.

In doing that they could make smaller content things but increase everyone's playtime....with alot of players felling really special becasue they happned to have those items or powers or whatever and used them or found out about them.

Yah forgot to mention....with things like that its good to drop alot of clues pointing the fact some powers and things can be used in multiple ways...becasue too many players simply skip what they feel is flavor text...so they miss alot of things.

Well as mew said....she plays on the beta stuff....havent ported any characters to beta...and have not demanded to have a level bump...becasue mew is actualy trying to test stuff.

Probably will port over some characters soonish though becasue mew wants to see if her stuff she is finding is actualy stalker related or just how the game handles things.

with specific defense sets...i personaly just wade into groups and take them on when i need to....sometimes i end up using inspirations as well...like 1 or 2 defense ones....

Only issues i have ever had is that it just takes my Stalkers longer to kill things then say if i play a blaster or scrapper or tanker or brute or controller or soldier......i think they are about as slow as defenders, corruptors, dominators, and kheldians.

Notice how i didnt list Master minds...becasue well...thats just sending minions in to do the work.

But its not too big of an issue thats just the way stalkers play...their powers are just not made to do huge area of effect explosions or some single mostrous attacks that can be chained over and over.....I mean i end up standing there doing chain after chain....not getting anywhere very fast which is fine.....if I am on a team eventualy someone comes and helps.

But thats about how its like versus big groups of enemies....just sit there...concentrate on one enemy at a time....and eventualy you will beat them all down....just takes time.

My best advice for stalkers versus big enemy groups is to make sure you have your cones and area of effect attacks ready...and step back or move a bit so the enemies you fight are all in one spot to make the atatcks more efficient....try not to waste the....that just makes the combat last alot longer.

To answer the topic question.

Because defender powers are stronger...they actualy heal for more and give better defenses, buffs and debuffs all across the board.

A corruptor gets to do scourge....but because they are a coorruptor their blast damage is reduced....and since they are not a defender their buffs and debuffs and defenses are lower.

The best way to see the difference would be to simply team up as a corruptor with a defender or a be a defender and team up with a corruptor who has the same powers.

Then during the play time on a team left click on the effect icons and see what they are giving....

I think that will explain enough for anyone.

I do have one power i suggest you avoid....when you get to higher levels and if you decide to get a patron power set....and you choose ghost widow....

avoid Shadow Meld.

As you will see your defense inspirations actualy work 5 times more effectively.

Its duration is long enough to allow you think you are activating something real cool...then it just goes away super fast....

It also doesnt actualy give you the defense it says it does to all.....area of eeffect and toxic seam to bypass it...though not really sure if they where bypassing it becasue the power disapeared very quickly.

Well mew did find that as she got higher level the brawl powers begin to not cause as much damage to things. I.e. Mew could actualy beat things up in 3 or 4 hits.....now it takes mew about 7 or 8 sometimes alot more....

Anywise....mew on beta can still attack a box and the box will dodge still.....

Too bad stalkers cant hit very well...they go to all the trouble to sneak up on an unmoving target and still miss when they use buildups and accuracy inspirations....

<_<...mew cant help but wonder if the developers think if you try to smack the side of a building with your fist you would miss in real life as well.

Well Mew plays on the beta....

And well it works like it usualy does.

The Lag is very bad for both the brawling set and stalking.....As in the combo meter goes away even though your buttons are ready but server doesnt think the power is ready yet.

Damage from Brawl with the combo at 3 doesnt do very much for assassin strikes.....does make it so the enemies can get dizzy for a few seconds....

It plays about the same as Kinetic Combat.

By the way...Kinetic Combat and Brawl are two power sets that free players would have to purchase....unless your are premium for a right amoutn of time in which case you would get Kinetic Melee automaticaly unlocked.

Good thing is that you can choose in the galaxy city tutorial if you want to be a hero or villain....so you can play a hero stalker right off if you want.

Mew turned in a bug report and it looks like it was adressed....becasue when mew first was doing brawl....her attacks didnt do much damage.....and where all about the same....so thats a good thing.

One thing to keep in mind of the Rocket Board Power.....it turns all other powers off while it is used....this includes hide...so if someone plans to get that power from the market(its a permanent flying power that can be used at low levels)...just remeber this kitty told you about that way ahead of time.

Oh yes....spawn areas....and areas with special missions in them in the new atlas park area the enemies see through hide when you start attacking their friends....so dont be surprised if you sneak up on some enemies there and wind up with some bad guys running at you while you are hidden again and start attacking you....if you get out of the area a short distance though....they wont do this.

Anywise what else can mew say?.....was too busy helping other players who couldnt figure out how to get to atlas park onthe first day when the beta began...second day it ended before mew was home...and third day...was talking to other Legion of Catgirl Members about random things.....

You will definately notice a change in damage the higher level you are when using Martial Arts....it has very nice animations but its smash damage starts getting resisted by everything....in comparison to the Dark Melee you mentioned...you will notice with dark melee you do both smash and negative energy damage....thus it will continue to improve as you level.

All in all though...when playing a stalker you should take a set based on its graphic and play feel more then on statistics and numbers....

As any stalker will tell you...especialy ones that have played alot of the choices...they are all pretty much the same...with small difference...like Martial Arts is single target only for example.....and claws is a tad weaker for damage but hits faster and uses less energy....

As for the Armor.....the Nijitsu Armor set gives you a heal and you dont have to use as many toggles as Superior Reflexes....but they both have the same defenses mostly....but you will find the added toys in Ninjistsu a little more useful...thus the reason most people recommend the ninjutsu defense set.

I dont know if i should post this or not...but what he heck....

Its a way to bypass the ambushes.....

If you know how many are in an ambush.....you can kill all of them except one and placate it......

This prevents further ambushes from happening in most cases.....as i believe the developers made this a code becasue they didnt want people easily getting all the ambush spawns and killing them all at once..or having a glitch and killing all the ambushes before they got them...etc.

Though there are few ambushes that spawn more and more anywise...these are in some of the newer missions and the reason is for the shear overwhelming factor....these ambushes though you will notice give you no exp for killing the ambush enemies....(i.e. they where trying to prevent players from farming these things.)

I wanted to add some information that it seams some players have missed...

The "even if hit you remain hard to see" was never implemented for hide....it was only done for superior invisibility....the actual defense you get if i recall is 10% of the values while not hidden. I beleive the message as to why it wasnt implemented revolved around a pvp thing at the time and the way the stealth system worked. I.e. its outdated and the developement team has not gotten around to updating the system yet...i think they are waiting till they do the stalker passover....which i have no clue whan they plan to do that..probably after dominators.

And if you look at your values you get from hide...that means you get .2% on everything except area of effect attacks which would give you 2% defense. Yes i am rounding up....though i think the game actualy rounds down with numbers below 1.(ergo the reason freezing rain and such do 1 point of damage alot) This is for out of hidden by the way.

And i believe there is a concealment power or two that hide canot be used with....these ones actualy transform you though....

As others have pointed out mostly you might stack stealth for PVP and even in PVE no Stealth is perfect.....but some things you will notice have increased perceptions....like snipers or circle of thorns with alters....you can stack more stealth to bypass them if they notice you with just hide.
Stacking does not help with AVs they always have the same perception no matter what(meaning if they always see you they will always see you...if they dont see you then they dont i recall this from an explanation from a red name on the AVs and hero purple triangle things to make the game not so hum dum)....rikti drones and knives of artemis always see you...ambushes always see you...wandering damage or effect things...like the clouds or the storms wont see you but will always be trying to hit you while in their radius...but they will move toward you if they see you...and thus if you get hit by their effects or damaged you have your stealth supressed.

originaly...and this is a pure rumor....it was mentioned that there may have been a thought to make the amount of damage a stalker does with an assasin strike be based more on its current stealth rating....but this was never implemented and i believe the concept was scrapped due to other issues this would cause.(info from a convention)

Wait...before this thread gets too many people arguing......

I want to complain more about stalkers......

so my next complaint....
(beyond the sneaking up on a box and trying to assassin strike it and it dodges...or trying to hit a target like maelstrom with an assassin strike and failing 6 times in a row...)

what the heck is the deal with the knives of artemis......why are they superior stalkers then a player.....its like they are trying to steal the stalker job and doing a better job at it.

The hide and cloak and never have to get supressed...heck they can stay hidden while running ontop of yuor own caltrops.
And what about their auto-matic see you in hide mode thing.....nope cant assassin strike them most of the time...becasue they see you and caltrop you almost always.
Then there is their resistance to placate..you placate they run like 5 feet then attack again, or better you placate...they stop what they are doing...stare at you giving the look like: "what the heck are you doing?" then they attack you anywise.

Now i admit its annoying when you have spec-ops from longbow that do this too......but the knives of artemis seam to be attempting to take over the the stalker job.....

I say someone needs to write a letter to the paragon congress person and see about some form of regulation or sanctions.

I-8675309
Say Yes to Stalkers
Say No to Knives of Artemis

*This has been a message from Sponsers of Kitty Stalkers and Stalkers in General. With a Grant from some person running a costume contest in Atlas Park.

Ahhhhh.people complaining about damage and defenses....

Well.....damage is kind of low if you play a claws stalker....and defenses are a bit bad if you have regeneration as a secondary on your stalker......Wil power can be kind of difficult...though works really well in ITFs.

I dont know...my biggest complaint about playing a stalker is one of the Silly Factors....

You are in hidden mode....sneak up on a box...and you...MISS!!
or worse...
You are Dodged....=O_O=

Thats right the in-animate non-moving object box dodged your attack.....

of better still....

The Box...Deflects Your Attack..which removes your hide...and if there are other enemies there they will retaliate or attack you.

<_<...i just have been wondering since when have boxes and in-animate objects gotten to be better at avoiding assassin strikes.

Beware the NINJA BOX!!!

I just want to be able to put some signs onthe walls that have arrows and words so people dont get lost inthe bases...i also want some letters too....so messages can be put on walls....

But i realize....thats probably not ever going to happen.....

Heck i would love to have a command prompt to be able to put in rotation and coordinate position commands for items...but i guess taking the time to make a 100 byte script is way too time consuming....

But i do have hope for this stuff that everyone lists...after all....what the heck else is there going to be avaialble inthe market that people will buy in huge quantities...

Thanks for the response...thats what i was wanting to know....

=^_^=

Kitty is very happy now.