Standoff

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Personally, I'd be quizzical about it,...but I'd be reticant to ask or make suggestion, unless at the point of invitation someone had specifically said, "We have a tank, & we really need more damage". Unless it's set out why & what the invite has been given for I wouldn't, myself, find it comfortable to raise questions about how the person wants to play, as long as they are playing, & are in the action making a contribution.
It's a good point though about what we're expecting out of someone when we invite. We have our own ideas about player experience & strategy etc. I think I'll take a second to ask a Kheld if they're ok with, or can, blast or tank etc if we need one other the other.
In an otherwise balanced team I probably wouldn't make any comment at all. Switch forms, blast, tank or scrap as you want, as long as your playing & we're all having fun & we're getting through the mission .

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Unfortunately I don't know what basis the WS was invited on, as the tank was the team leader that had brought me in in the first place. I know we were looking because we agreed we were a rather low damage combination, and guess a WS was invited because they might be able to fill that gap, but have no idea at all what the WS was asked about/for (if anything) before their invite.

Sadly the reason I felt it worth making a suggestion was because we weren't at all balanced; in a team that already has a tank and a controller, a second tank wasn't top of our "most required" list. That said I was careful to make suggestions rather than requests ("Things might go quicker with a more damaging form") in case the WS was playing in "default" mode and it simply hadn't occurred to switch forms, but c'est a vie and all that.

Thanks to all for the feedback - it looks like the concensus is at least that suggesting trying a different form isn't out of order, which I'd sort of assumed (clearly) but it's always a relief to find other people don't disagree.

As far as why lobster was the order of the day for this particular mission, it seems less clear. Synergy points out that the Nova may have received no slotting, and his well-slotted Dwarf it teh uber ( ) but that's presumably at high level. The WS I was teamed with was SKed to a level 29, so at most has 6 slots to spread between the 6 Dwarf-specific powers and the Dwarf pick itself; I don't see how that can be too uber compared to the other forms, which would have received the 18 slots available for everything up to Dwarf level. On the other hand I guess inf may have been short, and only the Dwarf powers were actually populated with useful SOs.

As far as riskyness and mob levels go, I don't see how the orange or higher colours could have seemed that hazardous in themselves for an experienced player; over the last week or so my PBs been facing missions where party size and diff levels have made even the minions purple, and hasn't struggled particularly. As Calamity and Spacedog said, perhaps the WS had unspoken fears about aggro - impossible to discount, although the fact that my controller was pretty much permanently standing in the middle of the mobs running an aggro-generating toggle (Choking Cloud) and taking damn few hits should have suggested that the mission wasn't instant debt for non-tankoids. And the suggestion wasn't "Go to Nova form and stay there regardless", it was "How about trying something more damaging and seeing how things go"...if they went badly returning to Dwarf was only ever a click away.

We were going very slowly and steadily (not a lot of choice given our damage-dealing potential), with plenty of chance to size up groups for threats/quants before going in - it's not as though the rest of the team were caffine-addled fire blasters shooting anything targetable the instant they locked onto it.

Still, ultimately one of those "will never know the answer" questions, unless the WS in question stumbles across this thread, recognises themselves, and reponds.

FWIW if I come across a similar situation I'll probably make the same suggestion again.

Great - thanks!

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which TS server we using? I can hear but not speak I need to go to maplin tomo to get some jumpers so I can reconfigure my motherboard for mic use.

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Chaplains

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Are the details of this available?

(Please PM if it's a secret but I'm allowed in anyway)

A question on Kheldian capabilities, and etiquette when playing with Kheldians...

Yesterday evening I was having a rather unsuccessful solo - with LFT flag set - with my Fire/Rad controller when I got a tell invite (nice!) from a tank that was putting a team together. At that point it was just me an him, both level 29, and I said I was happy to team but that we might not have that much in the way of damage potential between us.

To cut a long story short a 3rd party member, a mid-20s WS, was found and joined us very soon after, the tank SKed the WS and we went off to do one of the tank's Rugged missions in Steel.

The mobs were yellow/orange/red, and give the spawn sizes we were pretty damn safe - the tank was hard enough to take them solo if need be, admitted to a scranky build (but had and used Taunt - nice again), plus I was on hand keeping them locked down with Choking Cloud, AoE and targetted holds/mezzes and just in case had them well debuffed on top of that.

In the circumstances I would have expected the WS to use primarily Nova form (which was definitely available) for all the big attacks and end recovery, with maybe a bit of human stuff for self buffs and/or variety - with the two aggro managers on the team that would have been as safe as houses.

Instead, the WS used Dwarf form all the way through.

Now each to his own, and I'm not one to tell someone how to play their own toon, but after a few groups of sloooooow takedown I sent the WS a few tells suggesting it would be safe to try something more damaging than the Dwarf. I got a single reply which IIRC said something along the lines of they didn't have/do Nova, and that was it. Half way thought the mission I asked on team chat if anyone minded me making a suggestion, and when the tank said "go ahead" again put forward that things would go much quicker with a squid rather than a lobster. No response at all from anyone.

So, I'm wondering:

1) Was I wrong in my basic assumption that for a mid-20s WS Dwarf form would be the slowest way to go. My PBs in the low 20s, and while that's a different AT from WS I've found the lobster very handy for soaking the damage, but very poor at handing it out.

2) Was I out of order suggesting the WS try another form, in the interests of speed (and the controller not dozing off - with effectively two tanks to "look after" in practice I had little to do than stand in the middle running Choking Cloud and fire AM whenever it was up).

3) If the answer to the previous questions are "No", and "Not hugely", any idea why on earth the WS was so fond of lobster?

3-fold gratz to all of you!

That sounds appealing, and the times (and stars) are right, so if there are spaces and the levels work I'll put forward:

Moonfire:
Stand'ard - 23 PB

Hess:
Stand'ard again

Citadel:
Standoff - 50 Blaster (exemped)

Being able to make the last of these depends on timing, but am definitely up for the first two.

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I had that prob for a while on nef, and it seemed I had arcs open. Now you say you dont have any open, but are you sure? You DO know that even if you didnt pick the first mish of an arc, it counts as opening right?

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Well spotted that man - despite my clues list being empty I checked all my old contacts, and one of them started feeding me level 11 Skulls/Hellions missions. A bit annoying to clean out (especially the final "defeat all" in the multilevel blue cave map) but at least the squid AoEs take out greys nice and quick.

After that Sunstorm started me off on the 20-24 arc (looks like I've missed the 15-19 ), so problem solved. No idea what the second open arc may be - possibly started one with a right-level contact, but not entered the arc proper yet.

So, big thanks to you Nef, and no thanks at all to Cryptic for using a "you're not high enough level" message when they're trying to tell you "you have too many arcs open".

I've been slowly leveling my PB, and have got him up to 21 now - picking up the "new" Kheld story arcs on the way was one of the main motivations for starting him off.

I got "The Peace Killers" and "War and the Peacebringers" at 5 and 10, as planned, then seem to have missed the 15-19 arc. After the event I can't remember whether this was lack of attention on my part, or because whenever I checked back to Sunstorm he said there was nothing going.

Anyway, I asked Sunstorm for missions at 20, then 21, and he's still saying "nothing for you until you have more powers, check back every 5 levels or so" - this is the point I checked the web, and discovered that I've completely missed one arc and ought to be due a second.

No, I don't have any other story arcs open at all.

Anyone know what the problem might be here, and how I can get Sunny to send me on errands again?

Great fun - and one more thanks to the rest of the team for restarting and letting the temporally challenged aboard.

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There's a post about the Ice Mistral SF a little down. It's running tonight, so you might still be able to join

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[To OP] R u hlr?

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Would REALLY appreciate a healer of some sort on Thursday as I had to play my lvl 40 healer rather than my lvl 36 debuffer who desperately needs XP for the 3vP event

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Not a full blown healer, but have Twilight Grasp fully slotted.

Plus a Fluffy, who tends to spam heals himself when he isn't busy debuffing packing crates (silly Fluffy!).

All the best LW - have fun with whatever you find yourself up to next!

Hopefully see you back in Paragon one day, when the batteries have recharged.

Been there, stormed that.

Thanks to:

Kinslayer
Caracel
Aureola
Dark Salazar
Deatica

for joining me on some seriously quick DE and CoT butt-kicking - damn few faceplants (tree aggro and nuke fallout, and that's about it), much speedy bashing and respecs and badges all round!

I have to admit the xp's a major factor, although not a critical one if people are pushed for time. That said I'd like to get some xp out of it, so redoing the 24-33 respec isn't really viable.

As far as difficulty level goes, I'm inclined to set it back down to Villainous (currently at Villain.Invincible) unless you think Villain.Rugged would be doable without too much pain.

All assuming we can find contestant #4 from somewhere, of course.

Another "another"! More gratz to you, Kron!

Big gratz to you, Jewel!

If I can get enough interest I'd like to take my villain main on this trial this evening - several bars to go to 40, and contact missions are starting to look like they're in short supply!

Level-wise I'd like to keep it 38+ (actual level or LKed), as bitter experience has shown too wide a range leads to much debt-ridden unhappiness.

Meet by Trasprecial at East side of main Nerva island (858, 87, 2477).

All in suitable level range welcome, and if anyone has more experience than me of actually doing the villains' respec (I've only done it the once) I'm happy to let them do the steering.

Edit: Added which zone the respec actually starts in!

If there are spaces I'll put Alathar forward as another "probably" on Thursday.

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Gratz Aero, soon I shall join you!
.........
Eventually I shall join you!!!

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Cor, look who's come back to see us now I7's on test!

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Easy enough, and more important, great fun! Shame on that proximity bomb that prevented us from a flawless victory (oh that and the suicide nova only a crazy blazta can do hehe)

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Indeed. I may write a letter to the TV Fusion Power Corp about this; leaving that sort of thing lying around in corridors just has to be in violation of health and safety regs...

Another volunteer for Numina (again, not about for Manticore) - Sushi-san, 36 scrapper.

Gratz to the footless Aero!

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thx to amazing red, kara shadow, omega sinner, UN medic droid, xyber, sushi-san and natures mistake for helping out with the respec. only took us abit more than a hour

Was a great team only a few deaths but not tht many. was loads of fun. thx again

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Great fun Pie - stormed through it with much carnage, xp and jet-propelled Stoning from Red. Thanks for setting everything up!

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One thing I always wanted to ask, on the Taunts with a tohit check(Kheldian Dwarfs and Provoke)the cap is always 5?
Or is 5 people hit?
Because I clearly remember taunting a mob with my Dwarf Antagonize a second after my SK has gone to Hospital(don't say nothing..)and seeing like 8-10 'MISS' in that mob.

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Trying to recall the official explanation for how missable AoE effects - including Antagonize - works, I'm pretty sure the calculations start with the centre of the AoE (the target in this case) then work outwards applying the hit check to each mob in turn. When the limit on the number of affectable mobs has been reached, or all mobs in the AoE's coverage have been checked (whichever comes first), the checks stop.

So if there were 18 mobs in the Antagonize's potential AoE you could find yourself missing 10 of them in the course of chocking up 5 hits, leaving 3 left untested because you reached the limit before the calculation engine got round to them.