Red_Zero

Well, it looks like the whole "City of Blasters" was more due to the game enviroment, learning curve of other ATs, and that other AT's were still in need of some adjustments. The only adjustment to the actual blaster was correcting the smoke grenade bug. Once that all changed it balanced out more or less.

I just find the whole "OH NO! It will make everything City of Blasters again!" argument just plain silly, considering how much things have changed. Blasters are in need of some adjusting up, I think Issue #3 rather proved that, when they tried to make the enviroment tougher only to find that it was only favorable to Tankers and Scrappers.

Wasn't that all before the purple patch too?

The way I understand it, the Uber power that supposively made it "City of Blaster" was the smoke grenade, which got "adjusted" nearly out of existance. I really find this unbeliveable that one power in one secondary set of one Archtype makes it so that the entire archtype is so dominate. This seems so blow out of proportion. If this was the case, maybe it should have been called "City of Smoke Grenades"

City of Blaster is a myth.

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Um, I've always remembered Buildup as +100% and aim as 62.5%... I really don't know where you got that 65 and 35...


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I dug those numbers up a long time ago, and unfortunately can't find the source to quote from, but they always seemed valid and worked for me. If your right though, that means blasters are capable of pushing much further pasted the cap than I stated.

Raising the damage cap is only one part of the solution. It won't solve the whole problem, only a small part of it, but an important and conceptually significant part in the eyes of many, even if its overall game effect would be minor.

The damage cap is a issue because raising it gives blasters more room to play with it. In the early game, the damage cap isn't an issue at all except in extreme and unlikely circumstances. When you do a Build Up, you see a huge difference, when you pop a Red Insperation, you get results, and when you do it all, for a breif while your a force to be reconned with. By about level 25 you've lost that room, it just doesn't work that way anymore, and you can start feeling the cap.

Just FYI:
Base (100%) + 6 SO's at Level +3 (230%) + Build UP (65%) + Aim (35%) + Assault (18.75%) + One Red Insperation (25% / 33% / 50%) = 473.75% to 498.75%

Just one more teammate buff and it can easily break 500%. We are only asking for 500% here, not the moon and the stars.

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BTW, it seems that inspirations break the damage cap. Here's some figures for you.

Level 36 AR blaster

Weapon: Sniper Rifle, six-slotted 35++ DMG, plus Build-Up.
Target: Level 18 Tsoo minion (Crane Enforcer)

First shot, theoretically at 400% damage cap, 1432.13

Second shot, theoretically at 400%, plus a 25% Rage inspiration, 1508.23.

This experiment leads me to believe that this isn't capped where people say it is.

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Your level 36 and your enhancements are only level 35++. This means your not at you max potential. You would have to be using 37++ or equivilant to not see Rage make a difference. Your test is in error because your SO's are short by 2 levels.

Don't for get Red Insperations and Fortitude from Empathy Defenders.

But that's the focal point of raising the damage cap above 400%. Blaster ARE well and trully capable of raising there damage to or maybe just above 400% just with SO's and Build UP. Add Aim, Assault, and a single Red Insperation, and you can obviously obtain more potential very easily, but can't because you have a cap that is set too low. I stop carrying Red Insperation in my mid 20's because it wasn't very useful anymore.

Its very frustrating to be able to self-buff yourself past a cap, but not be able to benifit from it, and have other people throw a buff on you or hand you a big nice juicy Red Insperation and then have to turn around and say "I appreciate the thought but your really wasting your time, go buff some other AT that can use it, like a scrapper."

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Some might argue that this can be mitigated by using say fly/hover. Two issues: 1. If you get mezzed, you drop into melee range, and 2. I understood that it was never intended to steer particular builds (even Hasten and Stamina) for playability.

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Have you ever noticed that when mobs with hover/flight get mezzed they rarely if ever drop to the ground, yet you always do? In fact, if its a mez like stun they can still move at flight speed and jump instead of walking drunkenly, or encased in a block of ice hanging mysteriously in mid-air. I would really like to have some good insight into this descrepancy, especially since have the reason to mez something might be to get it on the ground for the rest of the team to clobber.

I would like to point out that Statesman, that Blasters are more than capable of hitting their head on thier own damage cap. With ++SO's, Build Up, and Assault you can easily reach that cap and still have Aim left over for more damage. Damage Insperations and Teammate Buffs become superficial after that. Raising the damage cap would give blasters more headroom that they need. Its unfair to have the capability to exceed your own damage cap by your own inate powers and yet be limited by such a boundry. I also think other ATs capable of buffing teammates would appreciate it if we could use the buffs we recieve to there fullest extent.

I should also point out that many mobs that did not have ranged attacks now do after Issue 3 and that mob range at high levels exceeds typical blaster range.

Finally, some builds have more melee attacks or near-melee attacks than they do basic ranged attacks. This is even further compounded by the fact that you can pick up more melee attacks from Power Pools. A couple melee attacks for a ranged blaster are good. Having too many means your not a ranged blaster, your a scrapper without defenses.

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Problem is I outlevelled most of the Hollows and Striga content only doing missions. I made another character just to go through all the hollows stuff and found it difficult to stay within the level restrictions to finish Hollows storylines. Halving the debt in missions means I need to spend more time dying outside of missions.

I'd like to see missions scale to your security level clearance more. I suppose a Flashback system is the alternative to this, but if the missions scaled then the enemies inside would always be around your level so we wouldn't need level restrictions.


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ditto!! Jeez im trying hard not to outlevel my contacts and i couldnt do it for the first arc and hollows....my main toon existed pre-hollows and even now in the 40's i have to be careful about how fast i lvl, as it stands now i gotta dig up a group to do the Quaterfield TF soon or ill have to exmp to do it (yeech!). If i got one level every 5 with street sweeping or god forbid getting xp on someone elses mish, i wouldnt be able get all the arcs and title mish's!




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I think what this is really showing in the great need (necessity) for getting "The FlashBack System" that has been talked about for sooooooo long, yet we never hear any progress on it, and keep wondering why in blazes it is taking sooooooo long to implement.

Especially now that new mission content has been added, and you want to go Stirga and do it with your favorite Character, but LOL, your favorite Character is level 50 because you've been playing all those other missions and story arcs because your really liking the content.

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Couple of changes we're making in I5:

1) Instead of the first five levels being debt free, the first TEN levels will be debt free.

2) XP debt will be halved on mission maps (that includes outdoor mission maps, too).

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I don't understand the reason behind #1. Would like some clarification on how that idea got started. I think being debt free from 1 to 5 is good. Debt isnt really bad until much later in the game. If #1 is some kind of quick fix to cure the travel-debt problem players have for getting to The Hollows and Perez Park missions then I don't think this is what people are really looking for.

I fully support #2. Some missions for some unknown reason just wipe-out teams. Can't pin it down to anything other than just bad luck. It just happens. I really value teammates that can tough out those hard luck mission, which mean I have to do the same.

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Well that and saying the words blaster like a curse word, yes yes it's a giant evil plot by the blasters to try and gank everyone. Didn't you get the memo?

Anyway the words bolded to make a point show why 1v1 must be balanced as well. Because if the foundations of pvp aren't balanced then as you say right here, anything else above it won't be balanced either, unless you have a proper team of course.

It should be a fair fight no matter what AT goes up against what AT. Now don't confuse fair with easy, as a defender I expect to work my [censored] off to debuff a tank enough to scratch him, I need to be careful to try and dodge a blaster till I can get in close enough to try and land some holds and go from there. And I realy right now need to be careful 1v1'ing a controller as if my toggle build gets held it's bye bye birdie 90% of the time. Defenders.. Ok i'm not sure as well how i'd 1v1 one of my own, the builds have a bit more variety. Scrappers, debuff, and pray they never get near me.

The point though i can think off the top of my head viable 1v1 one tactics to deal with most AT's on paper. But in the arena it's a whole nother story, I couldn't to save my life even slightly dent a tank on my first go, even with the elec blaster in a lil 3 player free for all trying to get him at the same time. He'd super speed through my slow, stun hit me to toggle drop, and 2 hits after i'm toast.

Totally impossible to kill the boy, specially after passive drop bug. I got a couple lucky toggle drops in with lit storm, but once he was unheld and retoggled, I'd have had better luck hitting a brick wall.

Now I didn't mind that much either, he was a tank after all, this was my 2nd arena fight, i'm still learning and thinking up ideas. (Well that and definitly respeccing back into hurricane) But it was a seriously one sided fight, and i'll admit a smidge unbalanced to me.

And therein lies the problem, if you have it unblanced at the start, then that unbalance just grows the more AT's you pile on top in a team battle. You shouldn't need a "proper" team setup to have fun in the arena against others, just to prevent what's currently a giant gankfest by some AT's over others. And no I don't just mean controllers or perma mog'ers. That just leads to bland and homoginized fights time and again, or the classic people refusing to start cause one side has X which is clearly better then their Y, and they won't change teams because they want to win, etc etc insert bilions of various problems and whines here.

Let's not forget that team battle isn't the only option. Battle royale is a giant 1v1v1v1v1v1v1v1v1v1v1v1 and so on, what chance do squishies have in that then unless they play vulture or be forced to dogpile or gang gank the nearest stunned melee or fellow squishie? Cause if they try to 1v1 a tank in that, it's no contest who is going to win, specially if two melees decide to be the ones ganking the squishies instead.

So what then? Does this mean we're forced in the great irony of ironies to team in the arena of all places? and when it comes to duels only melee need apply? Heh there goes that classic line of all at's being able to solo eh?

No thanks I could pass on that. Unless you balance the bottom you may as well not bother wih the top. Given that toggle heavy defenders and ultra squishie blasters may as well paint giant [censored] bullseyes on their backs right now, as melee rules the roost, specially super speed jousters or perma powers that I knew should never have been allowed to be made perma in pve alone. Least melee rules when we're not being chain held anyway.

No sorry, I agree with the OP. Color me very unimpressed with how busted pvp is right now, and not balanced at all. I'll probably be spnding a lot more time at icons, or leveling alts in I4 pve then I will in the arena if it stays as is right now.

Cause lets face it, proper isn't going to always happen with people, it's the nature of the beast to want to win. And what a shock that pvp is already bringing out the worst in a city of "heroes"

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All well said Dragonkat.

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1v1 does NOT have to be balanced. What your post suggests is that you just want to have 1v1 survivability, which is also suggest by your main being a blaster. The reason that 1v1 shouldn't be bothered is because it invovles no team strategy whatsoever.

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Doing 1 on 1 combat is good for learning the basics on how to deal with each Archtype. It help give a good feel for what you can expect from several players individually in team combat and lets you evaluate your own effectiveness and possible stratagies. My key issue isn't my own survivablity in terms of defense, blaster defense is fine as it is even if its pathetic. Period. Its my own survivablity in terms of offense. If my Main is a blaster then the best defense is a superiour offense. Running, flanking, shooting, rinse and repeat. However, Scrappers and Tankers have such massive defenses and offensive capacity that it takes way too much even if they are just standing there and taking it all, and then one-two they get in a couple shots and its over with.

And after playing a few 2-on-2 battles with a Dark Defender I know, it was scary considering that I meleed a tank to defeat and completely vaporized a scrapper from full to zero hit points in a single nuclear strike (and hit him so hard the "ankle bitter" bug occured when he rezzed.)

But I've also had other team battles where the first thing the tankers and scrappers on either side did was elimate all the "Squishes" first, because they were helpless against their defensive might and totally vulnerable to their offensive power, and then slugged it out with each other.

Frankly, If a tank or scrapper is going after me, I want it to be because I am a real standing threat, and not just an easy target that dies quickly. I imagine this could be a real problem for Controllers and Defenders as well.

Considering City oF Heroes was originally designed to specifically not have PvP combat, I'm wondering if the Arena is going to be a viable feature, or just one in which only 1 or 2 Archtypes real enjoy. And if Arena is suppose to be the test for meshing CoH with CoV in the future, then stay away from the PvP zones because you can bet there will be 1 on 1 situation lurking there.

All battles, even large ones, require that there be some kind of 1 on 1 balance, otherwise thoses with defense quickly overrun those without. As it is now High Defense ATs can damage Low (to Non-Existant) Defense ATs much more rapidly, many times in 2 shots, than Low Defense ATs can retaliate or make due. This means the basic stratagy become squish the low stuff because its easy and only confront the higher stuff later if you have to. If 1 on 1 balance is ignored it will cause a lot of greif over the arean in general.

HEY! Your right, I never though about that, but that Icon store is right off the King's Row Exit in Indy Port. Still, I dont like the idea of waltzing in to Indy Port at level 8, and I don't think a lot of newer players would think to even check that far pasted the exit in Indy Port after spotting just one level 20+ anything.

However, given the background of King's Row as a garment district, I think a tailor shop would be a nice and fitting addition to the area, and a place where younger level character are supposed to be. Maybe not an Icon store, but something like a Mom & Pop outfit, helping heroes who help out the community of King's Row. Mom, being a layed-off factory machinist does the arc welding and metal working for costumes while Dad does the sewing.

WOOOHOOO!! Finally, something more comfortable than armor and more durable than elastic underwear! I think some of my characters are going to need bigger closets.

Any chance of getting an Icon or tailor store in say, Galaxy City, Atlas park or King's Row. King's Row is or was supposed to be the garment manufacturing district in Paragon City. Not much in King's Row as is, not even basic store or trainer, it could use a little business.

Awesome! Thank you greatly. As a person who enjoys team play and soloing equally as much, this is a great relief. I also feel that my blaster will now find some value in adjusting the difficulty slider.

I think the main problem may be in what a boss may have to be in order to be a going concern for a tank or scrapper vs. what that same boss would do to other archtypes given their weaker defences and hit points. It will be interesting to see how this resolves with the PvP arena in the future.

Simply put: The Blaster Archtype in a nutshell is damage at range.

This is their primary defence: take it down fast, take it down hard.

This is their primary weakness: low hitpoints, low (or nonexistant) defences, low aggro control with High aggro potential. Mobs favor blasters to almost anything else. Only tanks rate higher in aggro because they specialize in it.

As it was before Issue #3, Fighting a single unnamed boss could be hazardous if unprepared or cornered, Fighting 2 was something that could put you in the hospital, fighting 3 was out of the question, and I have always given special attention to Named bosses if only for the fact that some developer had given it enough attention to at least give it a special name if nothing else (even if it's really just a named LT.)

Frankly, when soloing as a blaster, I find that, given the commonallity of unnamed bosses, that it was unnecissary to make them tougher. I have a long list of common bosses of equal level that I would approach carefully before attacking, and not at all if at +2 or higher or with multiple bosses or large groups of underlings.

With Issue #3, I have found these bosses to be unapprocable now. They do way too much damage (can defeat equal level blaster in two hits) and take way too long to fight as they have more health and are more resistant to damage. This means that prolonged battles can now easily exhaust a blaster's resources leading to certain defeat.

It was my understanding that this was the function of Arch Villians, Monsters, and the new Elite Boss clasifications. Things that no hero should attempted to do solo.

However, even in groups, if insufficiant aggro control is present on the team, the blasters will perish quickly now, and considering the how common at higher levels multi boss mobs are for teams on TF's and Trials, I find this to be a greatly disturbing aspect.

This is compounded even more when you consider that may TF actually require more that 6 players, increasing not only the level of the bosses, but the numbers of them in a mob, and the number of mobs in total, making it perilous for a team to aggro more than one mob at a time (which is easy to do at intersections and branches on a map.)

This is now compounded even further by the fact that TF's set their base level by the level of the highest qualified level on the team. If a blaster is on a team where he is -3 levels from the highest team member, it is possible that he can not be Sidekicked, and will see everything +5 his level for the whole TF. This makes it Imperitive that a blaster be equal to the highest member of the team, otherwise the level difference alone will be enought to make him either live in constant debt, or quit, as their damage will be near ineffective and the basic attacks lethal to him.

It would seem more logical to use a system on TF's and Trials that matches what monsters now do, Con to each player on a team as being equal to their own level +/- an appropriate level difference (such as Villian X = player level +/- bonus level + Type status)
This isnt about having to need any particular power set, primary, secondary or pool, to deal with the new toughness of bosses. It's about being able to fight the threat with the Archtype in general no matter what power selection you use. All power sets should have, and have given the Blaster the ability to handle a boss or two of equal or reasonable level difference. And as a Archtype that emphasizes damage over defence and effects, it is worth noting how this has changed the ability of a blaster to combat such a threat.

It was my understanding that before Issue #3, bosses were supposed to be equaliviant to that of a Hero of the same level, LT's to be noteworthy, and minions to be dangerous only if in large groups or callously ignored. Now, the power gap between LT's and generic bosses is much more significant.

In classic game terms, A boss is supposed to be a unique and challanging foe. Usually specific to a challange or area, and at the head of a large and / or structured group of underlings. But in CoH, many mobs arise that have multiple "bosses", and can sometimes out number the amount of minions in a group. This situation is remincent of having too many Officers and not enough Soilders to go around. If a boss is so important then should their not be only one to a single mob, otherwise they are more like meaner versions of LT's and Minions, and not true bosses.

Cases in point: 2 bosses mugging a pedestrian, finding several Red Conning bosses in a mission only to find the guy who you have to defeat and his crew is a Yellow Conning LT.

If anything, It might be worth asking that, as one of the two primary damage dealing Archtypes, should not Blasters be able to do criticals like scrappers? At higher levels, having a ranged attack is not a significant advantage as all bosses have a significant ranged attack. In addition, the adjustment made that helps scrappers chase down runners, also helps bosses chase down blasters for melee combat. While many of the blaster's secondary attacks are melee or point blank AoE's they do not have the staying power of a scrapper to survive prolonged melee with a boss, as they are now, if the first attack does not incapacitate it, misses, or is to slow in effect allowing the boss to attack first.