Seldom

I'll probably focus on characters with a distinct concept/power they seem to be based around.

1st: Dreameater, Mind/Psi dream/nightmare dominator. Psy or dark focus if possible, anything centering around fear, sleep, or the mind. (Dream incarnation)

2nd: Deathsman, EM/Dark brute: (Manipulates the energies of life and death) dark focus for his death vibe, if possible. (Death incarnation)

3rd: Ionaut, Kin/Elec defender, who can control ionic energy for speed/lightning powers. (Speed/energy/electricity incarnation)

After these? I can't think of many I'd life to be an 'incarnate' of anything. The trick is that I'm thinking of incarnates embodying something. I'm not sure if they will, or what becoming 'incarnate' entails, so we'll see before I make plans for anything else.

5 is tough.

In no particular order:

> Supersidekicking. I can team with who I want, with what I want, and they can bring what they want, and still level up. I want to get to a Patron power level, but my buddies want to run the new story arcs, or play new masterminds at low levels? No problem!

>Power customization: This made me able to 'own' my characters even more, make them look just as I want them to. It also opened a lot more concepts, as I can make differentiated powers visually cohesive.

>Inspiration combining: so simple, but it's a lifesaver (literally at times) in common gameplay. It also makes unwanted inspiration far more useful.

>CoV: 5 new archetypes, most of them far more flexible in usage and capable of great solo and team performance.

>The icon store. I re-made my original character over 12 times finagling with his costume, as before the icon store the only way to change a character's appearance was to re-roll them.

Runners up:

>respecs-characters were no longer locked into build mis-steps, and could adjust better to power changes. (issue 2)

>The ability to sidekick/exemplar- though I like the new system, this did allow for more teaming than ever before.(issue 2)

>Global chat-the ability to converse with a player regardless of server/character (issue 3)

>Dominator changes- a niche/acquired taste archetype became viable 1-50. (Rather than being so late game/specific build-skewed.)

1. Dominators, you MAKE yourself invincible. Not by becoming immune to damage, but by making the enemies stop damaging. Then you smack them silly for even trying.

After that?
Corruptors/defenders/crabs/brutes/masterminds take second place, depending on my mood.

Here's the tricks of all the sets:

Rad: Everything dies faster, so toggles die. Mez drops toggles too. The heal is a tad weak.

Dark: A toggle to worry about. Tar patch is a tad slow, heals/rezzes require a target.

Kinetics: Constant buffing for best contribution, almost no protection, heals require target/close proximity.

Empathy: Reactive in its protection from danger, with higher levels of mitigation on long timers. (Thus limiting their contribution.) Nothing to weaken foes.

Trick arrow: Somewhat positional, very recharge-based, more focused on weakening than any sort of buffs. Longish mitigation powers.

Cold: Shield maintenance, late debuffs, an anchor to worry about.

Storm: Limited buffs, knockback mitigation problematic if misused, heal not that great

Forcefield: Shield maintenance. Only mitigation/knockback. Nothing to weaken foes. Defense can have 'unlucky' streaks.

Sonic: Shield maintenance. Strong ammounts of mitigation/debuffing, little to prevent damage.

Traps: Location/recharge based, so moving/fast battles are problematic.

All sets have a weaknesses. These will peeve you when you play them...some can be overcome easily, or overlooked. But they will bug you at times. You know what, though? It's the price to pay for your strengths.

Radiation makes stuff die faster, but needs something living to function. The best I can say is this: figure what lives longest, go for that. But realize when stuff dies fast, it's because your powers are working well. Treat those toggles as clicks that happen to stay on if you'e lucky. If stuff is dying really fast, just use enervating field from your toggles. It has a faster cast, but still helps stuff keel over well.

*Offline SG/VG stuff, 'global' rather than character membership options, so a global member can have unlimited alts in a SG/VG without ruining the cap

*Power pool customization:
Glow/fire/electric/minimal FX options for Leaping/Speed/Teleport/Flight pools, a 'custom weapon' option for redraw-less 'fighting' pool attacks. Non-tricorder medicine pool alternate choices.

*Customizable patron/ancillary powers.

*Cool new options for ancillary/patron pools.

*Engaging stories.

*Pie in the sky: Global teaming. Anybody from any server can team up with a friend from another server if they wish to.

Note: controller controls are not that much different than dominators, from a broader perspective.

Start:
Dominator dominate: 3 mag, 17.88 held, 36.15 damage
Controller dominate: 3 mag, 22.35 held, 30.59 damage

controllers have the edge.

'critical' control controller dominate: 3+1 mag, 22.35+16.75 held.

'Domination' control using 'dominate:' 3+3 mag, 17.88+26.82 held

dominators have the edge.

The trick, though, is player skill. A good dominator can count on domination, timing stuff well. A controller doesn't know when the next critical hold is coming, the dominator can CHOOSE when it wll arrive.

Standard note for -KB IO's:

These drop from the BRONZE 10-14 range recipe rolls at the AE, 60 tickets a pop. If you do a mission arc or two you can easily have thousands of tickets, making rolling for these cheap and fast. Sell or delete the weak stuff you don't want, you will get a -KB Io pretty quick.

Buying these recipes at the market can be enormously exorbitant by comparison.

The Atlas statue developed a peculiar yet serious case of snow lice. When the Vindicators arrived, they were asked about the seriousness of the situation. Inferno summoned his burning horde, smiled wryly, and replied "S'no problem."

If I am a winner, I permit NC Interactive, Inc. and NCsoft Europe Limited to use my name, likeness, photograph, hometown, and any comments that I may make about myself or this contest that I provide for advertising and promotional activities. I also certify that I am at least 13 years of age and am eligible to participate in this contest.

I'm going to be delayed...work and all.

I had a reversion on my 2nd-5th slot powers' colors, so I went to change them at the facemaker.

Crash, every time. So I tried on a new character...no problem. The issue? I was on a task-force/flashback. As soon as I quit that, my previously crash-happy character no longer crashed, and the adjustments went through all peachy-like. So as far as I can tell, this is related to using the facemaker while on a strikeforce.

For secondaries:

/Fire is the real damage dealer, with an end recovery to boot. No mitigation, though. Not as much AoE as you'd expect, but still decent with some great single target damage as well.

/Ice is a bit lower on AoE, but has slows and power boost to increase a lot of controls. I haven't tried it yet, but have friend who like it, friends who don't. Matter of taste.

/Psi is a jack of all trades, decent AoE, Melee, and range...it gives lots of flexibility, but less 'specialty' in one area or another. Was Psy shockwave better? Sure. It's still the best AoE doms can get, and the rest of the set is better now. Drain psyche can replace stamina, freeing up a pool and three powers. At max targets slotting for +heal, it also beats out instant healing from regeneration. It's THAT good.

/Earth is slow, but heavy hitting, and some darned good 'knock around' soft protection. It's also a more close-quarters set, with a single-target leaning. Power boost ups controls again.

/Energy is more close damage, with a single-target focus, and lots of extra control. As it has power boost too, this gives a crazy ammount of mez.

/Thorns is a close-up set, with many AoE damage attacks and a high tohit/slight damage boost in aim. This is good for making those AoE mezzes on their long recharges hit all they can.

/Electric is sort of single-target, with a few AoE's and build-up for damage. Another close-veering set, this still has some decent range. It has an undamagable single-target pet for its final power. This thing aggroes to you, but does okay damage, from what I've heard.

The earliest I can attend is 6:15-6:30, and I may be later as I'm in the central timezone and 6:00 EST is still business hours here, (5:00) and there's a comute afterwards.

But I'll make it as I can. See you all there.

(Bringing my Mind/Psi dom)

Backups for AT-specific badges for others: tanker/scrapper/blaster/brute/mastermind/corruptor/widow/soldier/stalker

The way the two mez toggles work against /DA stalkers is the main reason I've shelved my /Dark stalker for awhile. Can I do without them? Yes, but from playing /DA I know how much mitigation I'm missing, and once in a fight, I can FEEL it.

I tried to talk with Castle about it, but he says the main issue is this: so long as the powers are actively trying to affect foes, which they do while on, foes will aggro. The powers themselves are aggro powers, at least as they stand.

As such,
There are a few ways this could go:

Insta-toggles: I don't care about toggle juggling as much if these didn't have such a long toggling on animation, and could be brought back up quickly. Micromanaging? Perhaps. But better. (This means lowering activation/recharge substantially.)

Clicks:This is the OP suggestion, and has precedent. Look at willpower: an aggro regen aura didn't work for stalkers. As such, they turned the /Will regen into an up-front heal. I don't see how such a switch is bad. An aggro foe attack-reducing mez isn't working, so an up-front click mez with a long enough duration would be helpful.

Dual power: this is odd, but hear me out. The power gets split into two: One has the Aura/activation, the other has the aggro-making mez. The aura has one purpose: instantly turn on/pulse the mez when the stalker is visible, and stop doing so while the stalker is in the hidden status. So while hidden, the stalker isn't revealed...because their mez is "off."

No aggro: This is less likely to happen, but throw in the "mass hypnosis" treatment. Mind/doms can sleep/confuse without aggro...what if a stalker could fear/stun foes without alerting them? It's tricky because it means the stalker could mez foes without retaliation. On the other hand, it's not exactly killing them, so is this really exploitable?

There seems to be a bug around with hidden statuses 'sticking.' I play a hidden character, and swap to another, unhidden one. A friend tries to chat, and gets the hidden warning throughout our interaction.
Likewise, on a character that was hidden on a previous session but is no longer, the same thing happens at times.

The way to solve this, I've found, is to to hide from all, then unhide again. This seems to reset the hidden status to a correct one.

The funny thing is villains are idealist/dreamers on par with many heroes...just different ideals/dreams. Failing at a plot is fine, the villain wanted to try something new, it just didn't square up with the real world. So they try something new, hoping it will work instead.

Is this pathetic in some way? How many times, and for how long have heroes tried to halt crime? How many times do they futilely "save the city" before they realize someone needs to in five minutes?

Villains plot..they may fail, but their plotting/conniving is intrinsic to their whole "trying to take what they desire from the world" thing. Just as much as a hero is trying to better the world, despite not actually doing so.

As to the archetype crossover thing, and how much they get played: There is no substitute for a blaster, especially one with access to buildup/aim. For wiping out mobs, they can in a 3 hits wipe out almost an entire spawn, or in two hits at some points.

There is no substitute for dominators if you're going for pure lockdown. A controller can get their critical holds, but a dominator with domination can slap down critical holds nonstop with their inherent up. They also get damage on par with blasters, though they lack as many attack powers. Granted, most people don't value good control, but it is a dominator strength.

Defenders are now decent solo, and have always been good on teams. If you want to support, with some damage on the side, go defender. If you want to damage, support on the side, corruptors cater to that. It's a play style thing, but those two do have individual strengths.

A warshade has lots of crazy human powers, and can siphon strength from foes to become a force to be reckoned with. (Not to mention the tank from for emergencies, and the squid for damage.)

The problem with stalkers and peacebringers is that they have a specialty, but other archetypes are very close in that specialty...and the other archetypes have other tricks/stats to boot. Stalkers are close to being higher damage scrappers, but are a tad weaker, with fewer group attacks. Peacebringers can be blasting/scrapping amalgamations, but other characters have better abilities in said areas, with few unique tricks to peacebringers to distinguish them. And I hate to say it, but the knockback can work against some team situations/powers if not used well.

I'm hoping that something can be done to help those two. (Not sure what can happen to help distinguish stalkers more...they've been helped a lot.)

She's my Manticore, I'm her Sister Psyche

.........what?

Arachnos are strong and versatile, something that means despite even the past level limitation to get them, they were well used. (At least on Champion, my server.)

Dominators used to be a true rarity, but their re-balancing has made them more common. Still, few people 'get' them. The attack/control balance leads to people disliking them as either not the villain controller they wanted, or not the blaster/scrapper they wanted. Still, they seem to be around.

Stalkers are indeed a rarity. The ability to strategically eliminate is not well valued in a game where most things die fast anywise, so the crazy single target damage is often passed for something less focused.

Kheldians are kind of hard to find, but warshades are far more common than peacebringers.

So, in my experience?

Really common: Blaster, Scrapper, Brute, Controller, Mastermind
Common: Defender, Tanker, Corruptor
Kind of common: Widow, Dominator
Less common: Soldier, Warshade, Stalker
Rare: Peacebringer

[QUOTE=Venture;2827731]
......The game was designed with the premise that the player would be working for other characters. People who have issues with that need to either make peace with it or move on.

While I can certainly imagine a MMO in which the players were supervillains who pursued their own aims, it is not at all clear that City's software could accommodate such a design....[/ QUOTE]

But is this a villain or a henchman? Because you just described a henchman. Heroes get orders all the time. They're 'public servants' for the most part. Villains at most will play along if there's incentive, but will double-cross given the chance. Again, go back to comic book villains. If Joker started getting ordered around, you know things would get messy. But yay, we're stuck being Harley Quinn. The draw of villainy is the freedom it gives to a character to do as they please irregardless of social standards, etc. The draw is not to help a bigger, badder bad guy shouting orders. We're not wanting to be the Toad to somebody else's Magneto.