Starsman

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This wouldn't just make tankers last longer, it would put some tankers over a thin line into sustaining their rate of damage, and bring many more close enough to it to not matter. Not that I think that's a bad thing, necessarily, but I think reducing endurance costs and recovery rates, either for particular archetypes or for everyone, at an equal ratio would make lasting longer easier by default without affecting what is or is not sustainable in the long term, effectively making the 100 max end a larger influence in a fight than recovery rate.

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I would have to bring out serious number crunching to spit out the true repercussions of this in builds that have access to more than just stamina for endurance recovery this change would be about on spot relative to scrapper endurance consumption assuming equivalent builds.

The only other way I can see to make it so that the one set with Quick Recovery performs to better is to lower even further but give tankers lower recovery rates, the number to get there would require a bit more math than I can do right now. I'd say the same for endurance drain but they have ONES modifers. Only way to make those "weaker" is to make tanker Endurance bar higher (instead of lower end use modifiers) so they fill less of the bar along with an equivalent end recovery tweak so that things end better than now but not too better for sets with Quick Recovery.

Overall, though, I'm not sure that's a huge issue, extremely optimized characters may already almost eliminate their endurance woes, the issue is casual players and characters that are still in development, specially low level tanking situations where the tanker is forced to just taunt if he wants to go about using toggles and tank.

Vox, many suboptimal teams in this game work, but they are still suboptimal and in many dual or triple tanker teams, the main reason to have them is because you just need some one to fill in so you can get more critters to spawn. Only reason you "need" the tanker in those teams is to fill, and most (not all) content in the game is easy enough that you just don't care who you invite.

Come I16 you wont need people to fill those spots as difficulty settings will do. Not sure how many will min/max their teams then and just get members that trully boost their performance and entirely pass on sub-optimal choices once thats out, but it sure is a possibility.

Oh and:

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some Tankers have very good AoE damage

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Some scrappers can tank.
Some controllers can tank, grav can even herd already held foes.

Those are exceptions and no reason to ignore the true issue.

I was thinking something similar but much more simpler: every tanker gets a passive Leadership skill that does not affect self.

This leadership skill would roll up all 3 Leadership powers into one innate power that costs no endurance but suppresses when mezed, with slightly better numbers:

Dmg: 15%
ToHit: 7
Def: 4

So, all these things do next to nothing for the team with one tank, but start adding tanks and things get different:

<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>
Tanks Dmg ToHit Def
1 15.0 07 04.00
2 30.0 14 08.00
3 45.0 21 12.00
4 60.0 28 16.00
5 75.0 35 20.00
6 90.0 42 24.00
7 105.0 49 28.00
</pre><hr />

Since the tank does not buff self you technically can never get to 8 tank buffs. Truth is you still would never take a tank over a defender just for these buffs, nor would you take a tank over another damage dealer. You would take another tank because it offers something different to the team.

As for the endurance woes, that's another easy one: tankers are expected to fight longer, well, here is an easy one: all ATs have an endurance consumption modifier. Not sure what the raw base is, but make tankers 75% of the base value. 80% would actually normalize tanker damage end usage with the baseline damage modifier of 1, but 75% would actually allow the tanker go longer than others and that's what tankers are supposed to be all about: durability.

With a lower base endurance usage, the tanker may also find himself able to consider diving into the Leadership Pool to stack on top of it, on team only secondary builds that sacrifice in other departments.

Edit to add:
Although I am not sure i can justify a toggle approach conceptually or mechanically, I can justify a passive one both ways:

<ul type="square">[*]Tanker-like characters in comics tend to be inspiration to most heroes, their presence alone tends to motivate others into doing things they would not be able to otherwise. heck, their existence alone tends to motivate other heroes to exist. [*]Not all teams, but most teams that have a tank expect him to lead them into a fight, and they grow dependant on the tank even if in truth they may not necesarely need him. I admit I done stupid things as a tank, like forgetting to turn on toggles a few times after an endurance crash. This gets me killed. The team, though, always had enough support to keep going, yet, in way too many cases I see them just go crazy, they all seem to think if the tank died, they will follow suite. So the tanker is a natural leader for many, and leadership inherent would fit that perfectly.[/list]
Although both points would support your approach, well, the neither really is something you can turn off or change. Even the best of tankers, even when expected to lead, cant ever expect the team to do as he said. They choose to be inspired by the tanker (or tank like character in the case of comics) the tanker is not the one literally telling them how or when to be inspired.

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Really wish that Starsman would update his website that he has, as those charts would have much more detail about which powers get used for which settings, and such.

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I updated them a while back but "forgot" to update my site to link to them.

However, in the sake of simplicity I didnt add the list of selected powers on this version. I can revisit this and make them visible in the power Data tab... will see what I can pull off there without having to re-design the entire page.

Thermal is fire, not energy (although you may categorize fire as a form of energy)

I also did this split, i set a category called Energy but truth is that the sets we use with the name "energy" are more of a specific energy type: kinetic (energy blasts that stun you or send you flying scream kinetic to me, and so does gravity) reason why I set all those sets in the same row.

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Claws looks like weapons to me also. If you look at the wiki custom screen for claws, half of them sit on the wrist. How can you customize something that comes out of your skin?

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Same way i can customize my arms into cybernetic implants and my legs bone structure into best like?

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I am trying very hard to be understanding of such points of view, rather than just questioning their intelligence.

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Ah so you were just being sarcastic. I just saw that flame war comming the moment I decided to post that grid here :P


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Well, first of all, all claws appear to extend from inside the wielder's body. They do not "flip" out as you would expect from a device. Plus, several choices for the Claws come very close to looking like animal claws, particularly the villain style claws. Given the limitations of the engine, that claws on the ends of fingers would have to look like "mittens" as BaB described them, small claws that appear to extend out of the first are as close as you can get.

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Embed a sword to my bones, its still a weapon. Even the villain claws look metallic to me, and I'm one that considers Wolverine's Claws weapons (i stopped reading way before the whole adamantium removal and bone claws garbage came about.)




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Second, it is not about the appearance of the power in game, it is about the concept or archetype behind it. And the base concept of claws is an animal.

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I think, literally, the base concept behind Claws was Wolverine and just noted I see him as weapons.

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Hm. Okay, a few corrections and minor notes.

It's not "Plant Assault" it's "Thorny Assault". Or just "Thorns".

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Thanks, got to fix that!

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Thorns are also Toxic, but I'm not sure you want to make that an element. (It's possible to attack with toxins, but how do you defend with them?) Spines and Poison could be considered a weapon. (You already put Claws there, although I would consider Claws Body)

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Weapons would be things like devices, items, or... well weapons. As for how you protect with toxins? Look at the Villain Poisons set. Also there is a known villain to use drugs (qualifies) to make himself tougher.

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I would call Ninjas Body

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Set in weapons because the MM himself is using a bow.


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You have Leviathan Mastery twice. I don't know if that's intentional or not.

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Some sets I feel fall under multiple categories. Leviathan embodies both, ice and water.



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I would put both Teamwork and Training and Gadgets under Body. While there is Foresight under Teamwork and Call Reinforcements for Soldiers (and the armor) I don't know if I'd really call that "Gadgets". The majority of the powers are the Leadership clones, which aren't really weapons or devices, they are innate skills, like Super Reflexes.

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Leadership skills, although not psionic, would technically be mental, still I kept Soldiers a bit open, got to rethink that block.

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I would also call Widow Training Body and not Weapons, but I already said I consider Claws Body and not Weapons.

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I can see a type of claw being a body part but all in game options are just weapons.


I took the other errors and fixed them, but keep in mind, a set can fit two categories.

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Empathy and Pain Domination don't have anything to do with mental powers! It's about medicines! Don't you know anything!

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The devs disagree. (At least BaBs does.)

I also don't recall the last time an empath took out an injection and gave me some anesthetics. I recall him standing in a spot and extending his arms without touching anyone makeing all feel better, I also know how they can absorb pain. How can a doctor absorb pain if not via a mental link?

Empathy is an emotion, the full Empathy set is driven around pure emotion. There is little else in this game that is as mental as that without being stamped with the world Psi or Mind.

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Nature is Plant, Thorns, Spines and Claws.

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Although I can see renaming Plant to Nature and having spines tossed in there, I can't see claws there since all claws in this game are pieces of equipment.

I went for Body instead of Unarmed because, theoretically speaking, all elemental forces are unarmed.

Although I can also see players conceptualizing Invuln into many things, as it's set in the game, it's really your body in action so I can't see it as weapons. I set Ninjitsu in weapons due to its heavy reliance in tools (caltrops, smoke bombs, etc.)

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Its especially frustrating with a Stalker. You AS out of hide and one shot your target, THEN your dead target turns around and clobbers you!

Oh well, the life (and death) of a stalker is not an easy one.

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The thing i do have notice happening lately, though, is that foes will start acting even before my attack hits them. I can be at one mile away and use a ranged hold, they still get one shot because they react as soon as I start casting. THAT is a bit annoying. And by a bit i mean a lot.

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And yet you missed my point.... We as tanks, aren't even close to "theoretically" liquefying most foes".

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That was nowhere near your point on your last post, your only point was that I had not done any research about how Sups unleashes his full might against tough foes, even if i said it in the first post, that is, unless mind reading was expected from us.

And the point to begin was to justify the tanker "not being even close to liquefying most foes" with that same logic: those characters don't even attempt to do it by norm. My proposal was to give the tanker a tool to establish a warning challenge that would make you do much more damage against the challenged foe. Still not liquefying for sure, but at least without fear of breaking bones or kicking nuts.

Nop, always been this way. Effects are calculated after interrupt windows, or at activation for powers without interrupts. Hold, knock back, even killing the foe wont stop the effects from landing if the to-hit was successful.

Have been in a few double KOS due to this in the past.

Woops, missed that one! Fixed!

Was thinking about this a bit and decided to make a table that shows what conceptual elements we have in game and what ATs have access to them, the results: This table

I summarized the list in the following conceptual elements:

Body
Darkness
Earth
Electric
Energy
Fire
Ice
Light
Mind
Plant
Radiation
Sound
Toxic
Water
Weapons
Wind

Some may not agree with my category allocation and that's fine, I'm willing to rethink a few things, and some sets may fit in multiple categories (Like Scrapper Body Mastery can also be easily fit in Energy) Even if Energy mastery is the same for tanks, I feel a bit hard pressed to put it in Body just due to the concepts behind the set.

Anyways, here you go! Now you can easily visualize conceptual holes in all ATs!

PS: the recently announced proliferation sets are there.

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I would hate to see the math on this one.

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Geek out.

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*Dramatically removes monocle* Dear god...

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O.O And people say that I don't have a life...

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I have a life (if you ask my wife she may say I do but I'm still one hell of a geek,) I just happen to do this kind of stuff for a living.

I rather do it with game related data than analyzing medical coding and AR statistics ANY day of the year. That being told, I didn't do that yesterday, I did that several months ago, after the last serious tanker endurance debate.

I documented this on the spreadsheet but: the tiny "% of goal done by tank" should read 100% or close if tankers were actually balanced with scrappers.

Their Activity Window would also be much higher, the goal would be that the tanker can take longer in doing the same, not that both run out of endurance at the same time with the tanker staying behind.

I can force the tanker to slow down to 60% of his speed if so he can attempt the same feat (if he slots 33% end redux on all attacks AND toggles, so would the scrapper, off course) but at this point, although the tanker completed the same feat, he did it at 37% the killing speed.

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I would hate to see the math on this one.

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Geek out.

Sunstorm, I guess a big question here is: how willing are you to modify Dark Misma should it be proliferated to controllers?

Additionally: does the "if we give dark assault they will also want dark misma (or viseversa) also means you acknowledge the desire for electric control for dominators?

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The Fog of War is actually useful to me, I won't ever hit a button to make me have no idea where I need to go next on a map.

...and I am at 60+months already

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I agree, i would use it in outdoor maps but indoor ones, I love being able to know where I have not been.

Side rant: Hate teaming with stalkers that go painting the map before we ever enter it, specially when it's a find glowy or hostage situation, its hard to suddenly know where we have not looked.

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So it really isn't that controllers are always ahead of defenders nor is it the other way round.

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Get your fact ridden rubbish out of this place right now, young man!!!

But seriously: I think people are aware of the outliers, and the discussion is more about the general structure of the ATs.

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I was just pleased that the numbers matched my perception.



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You got lucky!

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So it really isn't that controllers are always ahead of defenders nor is it the other way round.

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Get your fact ridden rubbish out of this place right now, young man!!!

But seriously: I think people are aware of the outliers, and the discussion is more about the general structure of the ATs.

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Have we heard if we can change the powers customization based on the costume slot, or is it going to be one set of power color customization for one character?

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Powers can be individually customized per costume slot, but not supergroup mode.

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I think this confirm: we can alternate colors/animations (for MA/SS) by having macros switching costumes as we fight.

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&lt;QR&gt;

As I'm on my ice/ff controller I am reminded why I dont tend to play controllers much. To me the damage they have is lower. A FF/Ice blaster feels much more damaging.

Thats even with Jack.

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Did you try domitrolling with it? Take that fighting pool, punch them in the nose and kick them in the nuts!!! Air superiority in the neck once they bend down!!!!

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Damage/endurance, in any instance. An attack, an attack chain, an entire set.

If you kill a target faster than I do using the same amount of endurance, you're not less efficient, but that's how you're describing it.

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You making my life easy today.

Still feel forced to add:

Every attack by default should cost 5.2 end per DS of damage. This means once enhanced with 95% damage in SOs, they should cost 2.66 end per DS.

Some attacks have bonus damage as secondary effect (fire)
Other attacks have permanent damage bonuses that enhance your total damage without increasing cost (SS:Rage/DB:BF)
Other attacks have endurance discounts due to special situations or penalties (EM:ET)

These are the things that increase endurance efficiency. In the end, what matters is how much endurance it cost you to kill that target, the time may be inconsequential since burning too much endurance will force you to rest sooner.

On top of all this, tanker modifiers (.8) make it so that you actually pay 5.2 end per 8/10th of a DS, or 6.5 end per DS.

Scrappers, with 1.125 mods, actually end up paying 4.62 end Per final DS when you ignore criticals. 4.4 end against minions and 4.2 against everything else.

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Animation time and number of power selections has nothing to do with it, unless someone is using AEs while other attacks are recharging.

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QFE