Roderick

Sorry, I'm still hung up on the thought of "Carp Waffles", and wondering how anyone could think that's a good idea.

I was going to suggest Sausage Melee, but that sounds like a good way to get the thread moderated...

I first heard about this command from someone in a global channel that was having difficulty making it work. I looked at the parameters, made a guess, and had it work as expected after only a couple tries. The other person could not make it work at all, even after copy/pasting what I'd been entering.

With the help of others, we discovered that it was the space in his name that was causing the problem. We could all use the command to send mails to me or any of the other testers with one-word names. We could not get the command to send mail to multiple-word globals. We tried "@Global Name", @"Global Name", @Global_Name, and every other combination we could think of, but every mail we sent either failed with an error message, or disappeared, sent to a wrong address (for example, when someone tried @GlobalName).

I don't know if this bug still exists, or if it's been fixed.

If we're getting upset about the Reward Toker:Super Packs ratio (which is perfect in my opinion), shouldn't we be even more upset that we can't buy Empyreans for 1 Inf on Live?

That's cuz Sutter sucks. :P

Mortimer Kal is a valid option, though, and available in the same range.

Yes, but being ranged, they can be fired much more safely, with no risk of being hit by errant AoEs, or transferred aggro when a teammate dies or flees. The reduction in damage is the cost for the increase in safety.

Of course, if it's the same damage scale as Assassin Strike, but using the Ranged Damage modifier rather than Melee Damage, it'll be lower automatically anyways.

This isn't so much a suggestion, as me asking for opinions from other players.

If Stalker Snipes were given the Assassin Strike treatment (Range, Accuracy, Endurance, Recharge left the same, shorter non-interruptable animation with similar damage to the current version with a chance to crit when used unhidden, and long version with an actual Assassin strike when hidden), would they become worth using?

I'd say that the Assassin Strike (Assassin Shot?) would have to do more damage than a crit, but less than a melee Assassin Strike, for the sake of balance. Personally, I think this would make them worth taking, especially since they'd become useable in combat as a filler attack.

It's just too bad that, without Hide, there's no way I can think of to give this change to Blasters, Defenders and Corruptors too.

Any proc that causes damage or debuff will notify enemies.

Even if it didn't, the damage from Lightning Rod will notify enemies. Since they can't aggro on the source of the damage (the untargetable pseudopet), they'll go for the next thing on the aggro list: you. If you don't have a really high defense, the enemies will break your Hide before you can get an Assassin Strike off, and might even hit you even if you're softcapped. Your best bet as an elec/ stalker would be to target the boss, LR in, queue Thunder Strike while LR animates, and get as many crits as you can score off the two AoEs.

Actually, after i22 goes live, Lightning Rod -> Thunder Strike -> Uninterruptable unhidden Assassin Strike (plus Stalker proc) -> rehidden by proc -> Fireball -> Placate -> Thunder Strike would give you several AoEs in a row from a Hidden state (and thus a 50% crit chance on each target). And LR and TS will both take the PVP -res proc.

Crab Spider.

It's trivial to get to 32% def (all) without using any set bonuses, which puts you a small purple from the softcap. You can easily cap M/R/AoE or S/L/F/C/E/N with sets, based on your personal preference. You also get reasonable resist (all) and a Dull Pain clone for the hits that get through. Depending on which one(s) of the level 1 armors you take, you have mag 2 or 4 (or 6 if you take both) protection against all forms of mez except knockback. Since they're Resist powers, both accept Steadfast Protection for the +3% def and the -KB IO (and a recovery bonus if you slot both in one power). The Resistance toggle adds even more mez protect.

There's a few defense powers in the set, so you have lots of places to slot LotG +rech, there's a very diverse mix of powers, so lots of places for purples, and there's a built-in +recharge power, so you can spam whatever proc-filled attacks you want.

Most of the powers accept Defense Debuff sets, so there's lots of places for Achilles Heel procs, and I can't remember if the PVP proc is TAoE or PBAoE, but you've got at least one of each.

Oh, and you get tons of spiders to buff with double Assault and swarm your enemies with. Without any slotting at all, I'm pretty sure you can keep one tier of pets out at all times, getting them all perma doesn't take too much work.

One last edit: The only things on your "I know I can't have it all" list that I missed are debuffs and sustainable endurance. Almost all your attacks debuff Defense, and Venom Grenade debuffs Resistance. You gan also pick up a couple nice debuffs in your patron pool, depending on which you take. And as far as the endurance goes, your Inherent increases your base recovery and regen, so not only do you start with higher values, but buffs give you a bigger benefit. Go grab your +End accolades, slot Stamina, and remember to get some end reduction in your attacks, and you can go forever.

The mechanics that you're talking about aren't (as far as I know) part of the NPCs nor the "escort a vaptive" mechanic, but rather, part of the missions. Whiich means that every mission using combat hostages would need to be re-written. I doubt that they'd do that.

Personally, I don't have a problem with any combat hostages, except General Z. Strategic play (and not scrapperlocking) allows you to get these enemies to their destinations relatively unscathed. I sometimes wonder if General Z has a +perception power, because that seems the most likely way to explain how aggro-happy he gets.

I find that the issue with these pets is typically that players don't change their playstyle, and charge forward after rescuing one. This causes issues for two reasons: 1- The NPC has fewer powers than players, and is less intelligent about their application, so they can't save themselves when a situation goes sideways. 2- Rescuing most of these hostages triggers at least one ambush, so if it shows up while you're fighting another group, the situation is quite likely to go sideways - for the dumb NPC at least, even if you can handle it.

Personally, I think that the game is easy enough without the game spoon-feeding us the few challenges that exist.