Redlynne

I want people to set aside their anger at the "we've been ignored all this time!" point and pay attention to something very important.

Paragon Studios is exercising some rather rigorous control over information concerning "what's coming" in the future. How many people here *FORESAW* from 2 weeks ago the announcements of CoH: Freedom in the form that it has been revealed to have taken the business model ... and *FORESAW* the Time Manipulation and 2-Handed Weapons Powersets ... and *FORESAW* the revamping of the Galaxy City *and* Atlas Park *and* Mercy Island zones?

I'm willing to bet that before the announcements were made, remarkably few people outright *FORESAW* those particular surprises, in the form(s) they ultimately are going to be taking. Furthermore ... and this is the critical point ... Paragon Studios was very determined to not release any definitive information about any of this stuff prior to announcement. I know. I attended many of the critical chats. I asked, Live, when the announcement of a New Zone, which would not be a Trial Zone, if the New Zone would be a Co-op Zone or not. I repeatedly asked that question in the UStream Chat(s). It was repeatedly NOT addressed.

In fact, the answers that were being given about the New Zone were extremely non-specific, beyond the fact that it existed (and therefore was being worked on).

So the important thing here may not be what is being SAID, but rather what is being very deliberately left UNSAID about particular longstanding topics (Base Editor, Kheldians, PvP, etc.). And I say this not *just* from a standpoint of "wishful thinking" ... but from noticing exactly how information on future developments is being rigorously controlled (re: Black Pebble).

It is therefore *possible* that the Extreme Silence that WE are hearing on SG Bases, Kheldians, and the rest, is because they already ARE being worked on ... but Information concerning that work is NOT cleared for release ... in which case the questions concerning these issues CANNOT be addressed.

How many times have Devs in the UStream chats been told "I/we can't answer that" in response to questions, without revealing what the question is? Quite a few times, if you've been watching them.

So it's *possible* that Kheldians are being worked on "right now" ... but the Devs are "not allowed" to talk about it. This would be Standard Operating Procedure for Paragon Studios, as evidenced by how they have controlled the release of information of coming developments in the past few months.



Unfortunately ... there's no way for us, the Players, to differentiate SILENCE due to a release embargo from SILENCE due to ignoring the topic very heavily and just never doing anything with it. From our end the "quality" of the SILENCE is exactly the same.

Except that if you failed to get The Radio as a Villain Contact during the requisite level range, you CANNOT Flashback to the Radio as a Contact and do its Arc(s).

I suspect a plot by The Television.

Darn! And here I thought I'd found something cool.

Actually ... I think I know the perfect Avatar(s) to advertise our plight here on the forums.

• Grandville Beacon (arcane)
• Grandville Beacon (tech)
• Pocket D Beacon (arcane)
• Pocket D Beacon (tech)

Do them up as an animated GIF, with each of the 4 frames slowly fading into the next.



Why would this be the perfect Avatar for the forums? Because all four of these Beacons are "broken" ... even when they're working. Kinda like the Base Editor, really ...

Regrettably, I don't have the necessary "parts and pieces" in my Bases (nor the requisite GIF making software) to create this Avatar.

Just tested this out on the Public Test Server (minutes before it went down for maintenance!) with my 50 Ninja/TA MM (yes, I'm a glutton for punishment) ... and it works! The important thing here is that this is not something which applies ONLY to Ninjas, but rather is something that can apply to every Pet of every AT in the game. That said, Masterminds will benefit "more" from this trick, simply because they have more Pets ... and for Ninja Masterminds, it is highly thematic (if more cumbersome than absolutely necessary to actually DO).

The "requirements" to pull this off, however, are ... steep. It'll require 1-2 power pools (Teleportation and optionally Concealment) and 3-5 power picks (depending on your Secondary). You will "need" to have:

• Pick two of: Teleport Foe, Recall Friend, Teleport
• Team Teleport (yes, that's right...)
• (optional) Grant Invisibility (for Pets)
• (optional) Stealth or Invisibility as a 5th power (for self)

Those of you who can already see where this is going can skip to the end now.



The "pick 2" choice of Teleport Foe/Recall Friend/Teleport is purely there to be able to unlock Team Teleport, which is the real focus of this entire (madcap?) scheme. That's because as I (and many other people have noticed), the Teleport Stealth IO continues to apply its 120 second stealth radius effect for its full duration, simply because all of the powers it can be slotted into are all Clicks, not Toggles. And in this case, Team Teleport is the *ONLY* Teleport Power in the entire game which will affect Self, Team Alive and Team Dead ... which also includes Pets (since they're on your "team"). This was the core reason why I wanted to copy my MM over to Test this morning ... to see if the +Stealth IO in Team Teleport affected Self Only ... or All Affected Targets. The way that the tooltip info is phrased does not clarify this either way.

Time & Space Manipulation: Stealth
Grants Stealth for 120 seconds after teleporting.

So ... some testing was required ... to determine if the Stealth IO would affect Self Only or not.

And sure enough, once I'd bought one of these on Live, copied my MM over to Test, burned a respec on Test so as to pick up Team Teleport, slotted it with the Teleport Stealth IO, and added Grant Invisibility and Stealth to my powers (because Trick Arrow doesn't help me "enough" in this respect) ... it was time to test against some +0 Hostiles. Fortunately, there were "plenty" around the Grandville: North flyer zone point up at The Fab.

• I toggled on Stealth for myself.
• I summoned all my Ninjas, but did not Train them at all (to keep the aggro detection test clean)
• I cast Grant Invisibility on each of my Ninjas (one by one)
• Once Grant Invis was applied to all of my Ninjas, I performed a Team Teleport "in place"

I was mildly disappointed to discover that my Ninjas didn't "fade out" (more) from the stacked Concealment effects on them like I'd been expecting. To my untrained eye, the transparency seemed to be no greater than that applied by the Grant Invisibility alone.

Still ... nothing ventured ... so the next step in testing was to Team Teleport myself and my Pile'o'Ninjas(tm) right on top of some of the +0 Arachnos Zone Mobs up around the North Flyer in Grandville. Would they aggro on my (not so) Stealthy Ninjas when we all "got friendly" around the Hostiles? Only one way to find out ...

BAMF!

[...]

<.<

[...]

>.>

[...]



No reaction from the Hostile Mobs to our presence in Melee Range ...

... which means ... SUCCESS!!!

I even dragged my Ninjas (on Follow) around to other groups of Arachnos Mobs, just to be sure and validate my test. No reactions from any of the Hostiles. After that, I Team Teleported back to the Flyer (to log out, since the server was due to go into maintenance at any time) ... this time paying very careful attention to the Pet Buffs icons, as well as the Buff icons on my MM. Sure enough, I noted on my MM that when I used Team Teleport, the Team Teleport buff appeared on myself and my Pets, as expected. There was however, no "extra" icon denoting that the Stealth IO Proc had been applied to myself in the UI.



Practical Applications

It should be noted, first and foremost, that this particular little "trick" of stacking Stealth from a Unique IO and another source is limited to neither Team Teleport, nor Grant Invisibility+Stealth. Group Fly, for example, could no doubt perform the same (power) stunt, as could Group Energy Flight for Peacebringers, in lieu of Team Teleport. Likewise ... Shadow Fall (Dark Miasma) and Steamy Mist (Storm Summoning) are able to apply Team Stealth effects via PBAoE Toggle powers, and Flash Arrow (Trick Arrow) can supply a complimentary Perception Debuff that achieves the same (net) effect as Grant Invisibility, albeit as a Debuff via an attack, rather than as a Buff via an aura. There are also Click Team Stealth powers such as Improved Invisibility in Illusion Control that can assist here, too. So there are more ways than merely one to flay a beloved household pet here.

That said ... I strongly suspect that of the choices between a Group Fly and a Team Teleport ... the latter is often going to be preferred. My reason for thinking that is that because Group Fly (whether Pool or Peacebringer) is a Toggle, meaning that whenever someone (or some Pet) falls out of the radius, they immediately become (more) visible, which makes "keeping everyone together" more of an exercise in Herding Cats than most players are willing to deal with. Furthermore, Group Fly powers tend to be "expensive" Toggles to run, with endurance costs of 2 END/s for the Pool version, or only 0.52 END/s for the Peacebringer Group Energy Fly (which for this sort of thing, is practically a bargain!).

So there are "logistical issues" with doing this via Group Fly. It can be done, but it's going to be less of a "set and forget" sort of interaction of the powers to achieve the desired effect.

On the flipside ... Team Teleport has its own issues too. Pets have a nasty habit of wanting to fall out of the sky *instantly* upon arrival, rather than hovering for 4 seconds before falling to the ground. This can have important implications for using Team Teleport in lieu of (Self) Teleport as your primary Travel Power (if having your Pets fall out of the sky is a problem for you, rather than an added Giggle Factor). If relying on an Team Teleport for Travel, this will mean "needing" to stay close(ish) to the ground and avoiding teleporting away from the vicinity of hostile Mobs. That's because the Stealth IO, when *any* Teleport power is cast, dispels and recasts itself, creating a short window of "suppressed" Stealthiness ... during which you (and your Pets?) can be detected, and attacked (which has implications for Pet response aggro when in Bodyguard Mode). Still, even with those limitations, it will often be easier to manage logistics with Team Teleport (especially within close quarters indoor maps, like 5th/Council Bases and Blue Caves) than Group Fly. Even better yet, the Stealth IO Proc is persistent for 120 seconds, even if attacked. If you're attacked (or you attack), the Stealth IO Proc simply suppresses for 10 (or is it 15?) seconds beyond Combat, and then re-asserts itself if the 120 second duration has not yet expired.

Downsides to this whole setup are, of course, if using Grant Invisibility (because your Secondary is "no help" with Stealth), needing to cast it on each and every single Pet you have. Unfortunately, Grant Invisibility is *NOT* one of the powers that's getting shifted over to being a Target AoE Buff, like the bubble powers of Force Field, Sonic Resonance, etc. are in the Quality of Life update coming in Issue 20.5. That means needing to cast it 5 times just to cover your own Pets ... which at a whopping 15.6 END per cast (unenhanced), is not exactly something you want to just "do" on a lark. Fortunately, Grant Invisibility also lasts 120 seconds, the same as the Stealth IO Proc, so at least there's some symmetry there. But still, that Endurance Cost is pretty darn steep per casting, so it'll definitely "pay" to get some Endurance Reduction into Grant Invis if you can swing it. Without any reduction to endurance or recharge times, you're looking at 78 END over 20.85 seconds (3.74 END/s!) just to cover your own 5 Pets ... during which the 120 second Stealth IO duration is either running, or hasn't started yet.



Still ... you work with what you've got available to you, if you want to be able to "ninja" missions like a Stalker can (and does) while bringing your Pets with you ... and not drawing the aggro of the entire map upon yourself, just because you EXIST. The downside to all of this is that it takes a lot of Power Picks (at least three), 1 or 2 Pools (two if you don't have a Team Stealth power in your Secondary), and there are logistical issues with managing all your Pets. Dark and Storm MMs will have a (much!) easier time of it with their PBAoE Stealth Toggles, since they won't have to reach for the Concealment Pool to compliment their (Stealthy) Team Teleport/Group Fly to stack enough Stealth Radius on their Pets so as to make them "invisible" to all Mobs that do not aggro through Stealth.

The Character Copy Tool has long since completed the copy of a character from Live to Test ... but it persists in saying that copy is in progress on the Copy Tool, long after the Copy Transaction has completed. How long do I need to wait before I can make another attempt to copy the same character (again) to the Test Server (later)? 24 hours? 48 hours? When does the Copy Tool "get the message" that the Character Copy has been completed?

If image size were no object, I'd be submitting a view like this one ... (click image to see large). As you can see, that doesn't exactly "work" in a 100x100 pixel format.

Because superspeed doesn't "get me anywhere" I couldn't already. Because Ninja Run and Steam Jump are "good enough" for TRAVEL. Because Teleport can take me to places that would otherwise be difficult or time consuming during combat. And most importantly, because Teleport allows me to "skip" past things that see through Stealth (like Rikti Drones) and Hidden, allowing me to "ninja" missions much more reliably. And because Recall Friend on a Stalker is a damn useful thing which lets me save my Assemble the Team teleport for times when it would be the better tool.

Superspeed does none of those things ... and it's not like I need the extra Stealth radius, since I have no interest of any kind in PvP.

Why hasn't Paragon Studios hired Samuraiko Productions on a contractor basis to make all their demorecord videos yet?

1030a Pacific.