Tempest_56

With the I9 hype/dooooooooom starting up, it's probably worth revisiting things here. Okay devs - you tried. We get it. And y'know what? Safeguards aren't that bad, after you made a few tweaks in the process. The problem is, there's still a lot wrong with them and while mayhems are a blast, most safeguards are a giant pain in the butt and full of senseless, stupid problems. To summarize this thread and the countless others that have popped up:

1) The aggro ranges and ultra-high perception of street mobs. What was done here is completely ridiculous. Without warning, regular mobs suddenly aggro from a block away and see through all forms of concealment. With no indication of a reason, this is senseless. It also is a serious imbalance to things - street mobs attacking destroyable objects even before players can see them, being unable to move around without aggroing everything (such that a player who respawns is unable to rejoin the group, or that splitting up to try and combat the vandals while doing a side mission is often suicidal), and fights often involve multiple - sometimes as many as four or five - spawns at once. This is not a challenge. This is senseless and one of the greatest reasons why Safeguards are disliked - mobs that break the 'rules' without warning for no good reason is not fun in any interpretation of the word.

2) The anti-climactic and counter-intuitive nature of the entire thing. I'll grant you, this was probably something that couldn't just be messed with before I8's release due to the intensive nature, but now that it's out - it needs to be addressed. The entire point of the Safeguard is to stop the robbery.. which you do in the first five minutes, often in the first two or three. After that, there's the completely arbitrary time limit to perform side missions that serve no purpose other than to give you more time to do more side missions.
Additionally, the process is again counter-intuitive. The mission doesn't 'begin' until after the exit button shows up - people leave not realizing there's more, the mission being supposedly over means that you can't invite more along or re-invite somebody who's lost connection, and a host of other problems. The basic framework has significant flaws in it as it stands.

3) The initial bank run also has several problems. For starters, since the timer starts the moment the first person zones in, it causes tons of problems for teams. One person zoning slowly pitches the whole thing into disarray. Sidekicks are also a problem. As there is no real option but to bumrush the bank and the street mobs have their ridiculous aggro range, sidekicks are frequently thrown in over their heads - they draw aggro from a half-dozen or so spawns as they travel and if their mentor goes out of range for more than a moment.. splat. Then they have no method of getting back to the team, either, save running the gauntlet of super-perception mobs.
The robbers themselves are also a problem. A single minon escaping means instant failure - despite problems with them frequently disappearing or getting lost in geometry. Several of the named bosses use ridiculously cheap tactics - Shock Treatment's use of Power Surge and then running (despite outright statements that they shouldn't do that) and Savage Siren's tendency to use Terrify and then walk away have both earned their share of ire. There's also the problem of AVs and the bank doors - namely that despite the statements that we've got 'about five minutes' to get to the bank and stop the robbery, an AV being present can usually knock down the door in under thirty seconds, massively skewing the entire encounter.

4) There are other miscellaneous problems as well - chief among these are the problems of the sidemission badges only giving credit to one person instead of the team, and the debate of how marginal the rewards of the Safeguard are. For the most part, actually doing the Safeguard is considerably higher risk (given the time limit, the aggro range of mobs, the possible presence of an AV, etc) than the police band missions that lead up to it, but for marginally better (if even better at all!) rewards. The sidemissions especally play into this - for all the work of scrambling around to find, reach and complete the side missions, you really don't recieve any better reward than you would for exiting, picking up a police band mission and doing that in a similar amount of time for less effort.

What it comes down to is that Safeguards have a lot of potential. As it stands, they're okay - just barely okay. They fail to live up to what they could be, and primarily because of issues that could be addressed relatively easily. We all want them to succeed and live up to that potential.

Name: The Silver Guard

Website URL: http://silverguard.guildportal.com

Leaders: Novapulse, Blinding Strike, Bridgit O'Malley, Night Watchwoman

Method of Contact: Through the Guildportal site or by messages to any of the leaders.

Description: Protection. Respect. Truth. Trust.

The Silver Guard is an RP-based supergroup exclusively for heroes of security level 10 or higher with a heroic costume and a bio (sorry but dark heroes, such as Spawn, wouldn't mesh well with our group). We are a close-knit family who are justifiably proud of the group we've built. We have approximately 50+ members of all archetypes and levels, though currently our most active players are at the higher end with plenty of sidekick and exemplar room. Regarding membership, players who join the Silver Guard are required to log in once every 14 days, or make a short post on the forums explaining that they will be absent for a time. This helps us to keep our roster from filling up with people who join and are never seen again. We believe in fair play, having fun, being social, trust and friendship.

Our primary focus is the role-playing aspect, though when the Guard Steamroller comes into play plenty of missions get plowed under as well. While we never have a problem with helping new players learn the game's ropes, a point of pride is that our membership is fairly intelligent, so you can trust the people who are fighting at your side. We are also fortunate enough to be part of the Shield of Paragon, one of the largest and most active coalitions on Virtue - our allies include such big names as the Reciprocators, the Dawn Patrol, Onyx Securities, DEITY, and They Might Be Heroes. Members can expect to work with and have fun alongside all of those groups as well as other Guardians - be prepared for a chatty coalition channel (though we are a closed coalition, so no seeing just half the conversation), as well as constant communication through the Guard's global channel. You can be prepared to see us in action in many different ways, as well. Running our bi-weekly group task forces, planned and spontaneous RP events, arena nights, or large public events such as last October's 1 Year Anniversary, where we ran a number of costume contests and events that gave away more than 12 million influence.

In action, our approach is simple: we have few requirements save that you're an active member, that you're intelligent and that you're there to have fun. There are no prestige requirements, nor is there a great amount of bureaucracy - promotions are based solely on being a good leader and activity, and our team relies on the idea that we are all intelligent, capable heroes who work alongside each other rather than an army to be ordered and led. We even have foregone a group uniform, preferring to let each member express themselves with the silver and blue in their own way.

If this sounds like the kind of supergroup you've been looking for, please feel free to check out our website. The application process is relatively simple, and you'll have an opportunity to meet with one or more Silver Guard members in-game to make sure our group is right for you. We look forward to hearing from you!

I should clarify myself, I think. Since they've hit live, I've only failed one. I generally do them with a team, and I and they usually have fun on them. I would be lying if I said I didn't enjoy the missions.

However - there are still a number of points in them that just don't work.
Several of the robbery bosses are set up in ways that are massively skewed in difficulty - Shock Treatment's tier 9 + high damage, Savage Siren and the fear-spamming and Psi damage, so on - especally so in regards to the tough requirement to stop every single one of the mobs in the bank spawn. My one failed safeguard was fun, watching as the team got Terrorize-spammed and one lone minion with a moneybag that nobody managed to get the aggro of waltzed away. AVs being present as well skews things ridiculously - just the fact that they break through bank doors in seconds instead of a minute is completely out of whack. When we're told 'you have about five minutes to get to the bank to stop the robbery', and we actually get under 60 seconds, that isn't a challenge, that's decieving the players and frustrating.
The increased perception range is ridiculous. We're fighting identical mobs to those outside the safeguard, but without warning they blatantly break basic behavior rules. Beyond that, it has a number of negative implications. Sidekicks are the worst hit - I regularly watch at least one get smeared as, in the rush to reach the bank in time, somebody goes out of SK range for a moment and invariably one of the super-perception street spawns instantly obltierates them. Groups who aren't prepared or who are facing tougher opponents (See: PI Safeguards) are easily overwhelmed quickly and with no chance to actually do anything about it - just moving from one hotspot to another can aggro three or four spawns along the way.
The progression of it, the rewards and the general approach are also wonky. As has been said, the climax of it is almost immediately, and the reasons for staying around afterwards aren't all that good. XP/Inf/Prestige is earned as fast and usually easier by just moving onto another Band mission. I'm sorry, but it also feels very dumb to fight a Mu Guardian labelled 'Council Looter'. That's really just nitpicking, but there you go.

I like Safeguards. I'm probably going to continue to run them, and probably enjoy them. But they don't live up to the standards set by Mayhems, and have a number of aspects that fall sorely short. Safeguards CAN be great. They just need a bit of work to bring them up.

You can keep them there - as long as you've got the aggro still. I have more than few times lost it against a tier 9'ing mob because they hit that flee threshhold that is now so infamous in GMs, or because I spend so long not hitting they reclassify me as a non-threat and go about their business. Plus even that aside, there's still the problem that for most ATs/power sets, the fight becomes an endurance battle - lower damage sets frequently can't break past something with capped resists/defenses that also has high damage output. Last time my blaster got put up against Shock Treatment, I was three-shot. In that situation, I'm stuck fighting an opponent who can defeat me quickly, who I can not significantly damage and who I HAVE to stay engaged with for an extended period of time. Possible, yes. Oh yes. But not exactly a challenge in-scale with the rest of the game by any means.

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Well, no. Ice Mystral also appears as an AV for large teams so it is not just a PP. She spams status/mezz attacks and Powersink as the Lt version, kills you, then runs to getaway Mole instead of just standing there.

For starters, that doesn't sound like Ice Mistral. Shock Treatment, perhaps.

Secondly, the point is, again, mobs with teir-9 defenses are not new. People have been dealing with them for the last 2.5 years. Yes, they can be a handful but people have leared how to cope with them.

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The problem honestly isn't that the tier 9 is there. It's that it's a tier 9 power on a 'stop from fleeing' mob. And for most ATs/power sets, that boils down to 'do your best to survive against a high damage boss for 180 seconds while still holding the aggro and not letting them run away', since overcoming the tier 9 is extremely difficult, if even realistically possible. A PP using MoG is a pain in the butt - a PP who's fleeing and I have to stop to avoid mission failure that uses MoG is quite unfair to the majority of people.

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Complaints on safeguard and mayhem

1. Longbow, etc can see through ANY stealth. They can see you around corners, through walls, etc.

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That's entirely different. The Longbow in mayhem missions are ambushes - ambushes, of any sort, have ALWAYS worked that way, and this has been stated (I believe) as being by design so the ambushes can know where to run in the first place. It is completely unrelated to the issue of safeguard street spawns having increased perception.

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They did that?
That's omega level of suck! States' mission was one of the coolest in the game because of that: teaming with the living legend and being in awe at his power level.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's a glitch. I ran the mission a bit ago - you can even see the one minion standing there punching States, but no States. He's definetly supposed to be there. He just hasn't been showing up for, I dunno, two or three issues now.

Just ran the first half of Faultline last night with my SG's coaliton - two chunky teams, and a lot of fun. I tried to avoid any info I could beforehand, so this is all mostly initial experience with it.

The Bad:
- Way too short. I was shocked to find only six proper missions between the two contacts (I don't count the hunt as an actual mission). Having so few worked for the first half of the Hollows because of how fast you burn through the 5-10 levels, but at the 15-20 range, three missions is fairly short. Just one more per would have been perfect.
- As usual, the NPC AI is suicidal. Fusionette, NO. You are a BLASTER. Stop charging head first into the onrushing mob of Lost!
- Jim Temblor needs to be on your map as a valid contact as soon as you enter the zone. If I hadn't shown up early and scouted out where he was, I'm not sure we would have found him.
- That submarine was ridiculously fragile. It was also strange that nothing tried to stop us from destroying said submarine. It exploded REAL good, though.

The Good:
- The content was GREAT. I haven't seen the second half, but the first part has me very curious about what's going on, and the little twists were excellent.
- Similarly, the missions were very well done. They weren't just generic 'go stomp everything in the building for no obvious reason' missions, the unique maps were used nicely, and the NPCs were actually useful when they didn't charge suicidally. The challenge level was almost perfect, too - it wasn't undoable, but both teams had some tight spots, usually around the third ambush wave. I particularly liked the mission to rescue Mr. Yin - the named Aberrants and their comments were downright ominous.
- The zone is beautiful, too. There were a number of comments on how outright cool it was.

Overall, excellent work.

[ QUOTE ]
I believe you misunderstood MadScientist

[/ QUOTE ]

I stand corrected, and revise myself - I agree entirely. The vault door is paper thin as it is, and actually reaching the robbers before they break it is already extremely difficult. Having an AV as the lead robber makes it ridiculous.

Also, tangenting to the PM from Castle about the increased perception - I'm sorry, but that's an extremely poor idea. Devs, you've explicitly told us to rush the bank the moment we get into the instance. Okay, fine. But then you've put us in a situation where we are FORCED to aggro several spawns along the way, enter a stupidly dangerous fight and cause ourselves later penalties because we've left a number of aggroed spawns to trash the zone. It also makes stopping the robbers notably more difficult as every attempt I've been on so far has ended up battling not only the robbers but one to three neighboring street spawns as well - making it almost impossible to track the robbers in the first place. Battling an AV, an eight person Arachnos spawn plus two more eight person spawns of Malta is a challenge ridiculously out of whack with the rest of the game.. and yet for a Safeguard mission is very much a common possibility.

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I think the safes need to scale up in level, so an AV faces a slightly more challenging safe inside the bank.

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This is untrue in my experience. When I faced Barracuda, the bank vault was busted open before the entire team had even finished zoning in. Whereas versus a normal villian in a different version of the same mission didn't get through it until we'd reached the bank's outer doors. The AV broke through the vault significantly faster.

The ability for all mobs to see everything and aggro from extreme distances is a serious pain in the butt. After a few successful Safeguards, it's easily the biggest problem there. VERY frequently spawns will aggro from completely unreasonable distances (I had one aggro from outside snipe range earlier), and will start wreaking havoc on the surrounding objects before a player can even attempt to engage them. One player I teamed with mentioned that the spawns were aggroed before they even rendered on screen.

This makes going straight for the bank troublesome too - it invariably aggros two or three spawns enroute that promptly trash the area around them (penalizing the players), and spawns in the area around the bank also aggro. While my team survived our first mission to FF, the initial battle versus two full Crey spawns, the Arachnos robbers AND Barracuda was utterly unreasonable for the average team - we only succeeded through some truly excellent play and because the team was top notch (and equipped with a lot of crowd suppression).

Of the aspects that aren't design-integral, that one is easily the most infuriating aspect. Having Invisibility go from being able to walk up to a mob and /e batsmash it, to having them spot you from a full city block away is senseless. It makes any form of stealth worthless in a situation that directly calls for stealth, and works in a way which is both counter-intuitive to how the rest of the game functions.

The contacts list needs VERY serious cleaning up, organization-wise. My high level characters now have their useful contacts (ie the content) buried under six to eight police contacts that I will never and can never do anything with. It's a pointless annoyance.

One thing that was a pain was that side missions that had been completed/failed remained marked on the instance map - several times, team members have ended up doubling back to completed side missions due to being unable to tell which ones are still active.

I have to agree - this is very, very subjective and a lot of the numbers seem to be pulled out of nowhere. For example - Air Superiority, which is a truly excellent attack for the mitigation alone, is rated as equal to Maneuvers, a power with dubious benefits and one of the worst cost-benfit ratios in the game. Aid Self, which is absolutely game-changing for some power sets and ATs, is rated lower than Flurry, which is just stupid. No mention is made either of critical data, such as the disparity of Leadership's effectiveness when used by different ATs. This guide fails entirely to take into account the varying usefulness of powers to different ATs, power sets and playstyles.

As an Archery blaster, I find fly is a much better choice. Hover has been invaluable for mantaining range against opponents and for getting just the right positioning before opening up.

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the builder says stunning shot does about 3.3 brawls...

thanks for the advice though, it helps

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The builder is wrong there. I've also noticed the builder (at least Sherk Silver's) says it only has a 70% to have the disorient hit - which from my experence is entirely wrong. I haven't seen it fail to stick on anything that didn't have disorient resistance yet.

An excellent guide - and most of your thinking is virtually identical to mine when I made my Ice/Kin (as well out of frustration after my Kin/Rad defender hit a wall in the 30s). One thing you might want to note is the unusual way that Scourge interacts with rain type powers. While most DoTs, Scourge either will or won't activate, with rains (such as Ice Storm), each tic of damage has an individual chance to Scourge. So a rain ends up putting out a bit higher average damage, as the inherent will activate more often.

DO YOU WANNA SMASH!?
A guide for Stone Melee/Dark Armor Brutes


Why Stone Melee?
Stone Melee has a lot of things going for it - for starters, it's one of the most satisfying sets for a Brute. Nothing gets across the feeling of SMASH - the animations, the sounds, the damage all say 'pain'. That aside, it has some other good aspects. The damage is quite good, all up front, and often with decent secondary effects for mitigation. Which is another thing the set has well - between the boss-holding of Seismic Slam, the AoE disorient of Fault and the dual knockdown combo of the Mallets, it has superior mitigation capabilities to most Brute primaries.

Why Dark Armor?
None of the Brute secondaries are truly superior defense - with the exception of Granite Armor - but all provide sufficient amounts. Dark Armor can give you competitive defenses (with Tough, ~50% resistance to Smashing, Lethal, Negative and Psi, plus 25-35% to all others including Toxic) plus a wide variety of support powers - stealth, +perception, resistance to Psi and Fear, an excellent self-heal and three separate offensive auras, two of which provide serious mitigation.

Why Not?
There are downsides, of course. For starters, your endurance will walk a very fine line. All your attacks will need to be slotted for endurance reduction and you will have to choose carefully which defensive shields you can afford to run in any given battle. Overkill will also be a problem - you can't afford it. Choose attacks carefully as you go, trying not to use a shotgun to kill a housefly as it will waste precious, precious blue. You also lack knockback protection, which limits your choices in power pools. The pre-Stamina levels are downright painful in some parts, but with perseverance, you can make it pay off in the end.


STONE MELEE
or
My, that's a big hammer.

One crucial thing I have to state is that you want to set Brawl on autofire the moment you first create the character. This is essential. The occasional brawl will fill the holes in Stone Melee's slightly slow attack chain, keeping your fury up without detracting from your normal attacks. Later on, I strongly recommend picking up Boxing and having that replace Brawl to serve the same function. With that and a little smart use of attack choices, you should have minimal issues with fury building and maintenance.

Stone Fist - Get it immediately. While a 'small' attack, the quick recharge is very useful, and the damage is hardly as small as you'd expect. The animation is lighting fast, too. As a bonus, it has a small (I'd guess around 25%) chance to disorient the target - at least for minions.

Stone Mallet - Also grab it right away. It's the usual slower but stronger attack. With good fury, it does horrible things to opponents and has an almost assured knockdown component that's fairly similar to Air Superiority.

Heavy Mallet - The recharge is a painful 12 seconds, but the damage is huge. When you really get your fury going (the 60-70 region), this can nearly one-hit even con minions. Those that survive are hit with a hard knockup that sends them flying upwards before planting them on their back. While the fist and the mallet are your bread and butter, this is the meat of your damage - it's what makes life good.

Build Up - Some love it. I don't. Using it at the right time can result in a hideous amount of damage (on Test, I was able to surpass 400 points of damage at level 20 with Seismic Slam), though the ten second window for the buff is quite narrow.

Fault - No damage this time. But the mitigation is important. A quick stomp at range, and you nail an AoE disorient and knockback against a fair-sized crowd. If you want to tank, this is your AoE taunt. Though the disorient only affects minions, it can significantly cut down on the volume of firepower coming at you. I strongly recommend this attack - though perhaps not immediately.

Taunt - Why? You have a taunt already. It's called 'punching them'.

Seismic Smash. - <3 <3 <3 <3. This attack is love. With a good fury bar, you can do 200 points of damage at level 20 - by the Brawl Index, it's equivalent to powerhouses like KO Blow and Total Focus. Plus it's a guaranteed hold, even against a boss. This is your big gun. It hits hellishly hard, puts down any opponent for several seconds and animates very fast. The recharge is painfully slow and it costs a devastating fifth of your endurance bar, but it's worth it. You can't afford to whip out this attack against every random mook you come across, but when you need to put somebody down for the count, this will do the job.

Hurl Boulder - Ugh. While the damage certainly isn't bad, and it's the only damaging ranged attack you've got, this is a lousy choice. The animation is so long and slow that you'll end up losing more fury over the course of it than you'll gain. The only redeeming quality of this is the -fly component for bringing down annoying airborne opponents.

Tremor - Your only damaging AoE, Tremor comes in late and isn't terribly impressive. Another long animation leads into PBAoE damage roughly equivalent to Stone Fist plus a mass of knockback. While a pretty decent attack with good fury going, it doesn't shine in the same way that many other of the set's attacks do.


DARK ARMOR
or
Why is my graphics card screaming?

DA has toggles. Lots of them. Seven in the set, plus you're almost certain to have another three or four. This translates to serious endurance issues in the long run if you try to run them all. Dark is a very high maintenance set in that you have to pay a lot of attention to the situation around you and run only the toggles you really have to. Slotting for reduction, as well, is critical to survival. I found that I survival at pre-Stamina levels were easier by simply not turning any of my shields on and using the endurance instead for extra attacks. But once you're prepped and going by the mid-game, the set can really shine.

Dark Embrace - Mandatory, and worth it. Once slotted out, this is a 35% resistance to Smashing and Lethal, plus 25% to Negative and Toxic. Yeah, Toxic resist that isn't tied to a self-heal.

Death Shroud - This is your damage aura - and a good one, too. The DoT is easily your most efficient attack if you're facing more than two opponents, and will keep the hate on you hard.. which will keep your fury bar high. The main downside is that the endurance cost is very painful at low levels, as is the damage you get from all that aggro.

Murky Cloud - Your second defensive shield, this is also a must have. Slotted, it provides 35% resistance to Cold and Fire, plus another 25% versus Energy and Negative. Also (and quite importantly) it provides resistance to Endurance Drain. Putting this up makes you virtually immune to the irritation of constant Mu and Clockwork attacks. I've only had it once outdone - and that was Deathsurge. (Though admittedly I haven't gone against Sappers yet.)

Obsidian Shield - Mez protection! Sleep, Disorient, Hold and the ever-rare Fear resistance. This alone makes this baby worth it. But it also provides resistance to Psi damage! Slotted out, nearly 60% resistance, too. Absolute five star, A++, would toggle on again.

Dark Regeneration - This one's a nice little PBAoE attack that does meh damage for a huge endurance cost (a third of your endurance!). But at base, you get a 30% heal for every target you hit. So with just three opponents in range, you can give yourself a ridiculous 90% heal. Worth every point of endurance.

Cloak of Darkness - A utility toggle, this one provides your inherent Immobilize protection, plus a piddly amount of defense. It also gives you both a fair bit of stealth (roughly equivalent to the power pool) and a perception boost. While not terribly critical in PvE, this obviously is of considerable utility in PvP.

Cloak of Fear - Another aura, this one does no damage but instead causes fear in any minion that enters the area. Those that aren't affected by it still suffer a -20% accuracy debuff. The problem is that this and Death Shroud interact poorly - the DoT from Shroud breaks the fear effect, allowing the affected mobs to continue to attack, albeit at reduced accuracy. Running both at the same time isn't recommended.

Oppressive Gloom - Your third aura, this is the one I most suggest picking up. The endurance cost is minimal, but instead it uses your health up. The health loss if fairly low, though, and small enough to be a non-factor most of the time. In exchange, minions within the AoE are hit with a disorient effect - the magnitude is too low to affect higher end mobs. Again, this provides significant mitigation for fairly low cost.

Soul Transfer - A self-rez that requires a mob close by to perform. Your mileage may vary depending on how much you like that sort of thing.


POWER POOLS
or
Uh, so why do I keep landing on my butt?

Certain power pools are simply must-haves. Stamina, for example. Sorry, you must have it. There is no 'maybe' involved. You simply use up too much endurance and have too many toggles to avoid it. But on the good side, Health isn't wasted either. As a Brute, momentum is crucial to your combat tactics and you want as little downtime as possible. Three slotting Health can significantly reduce the length of your pauses in combat. (Though with Dark Regeneration, it becomes much less of an issue.)

The Jumping pool is also strongly suggested - Combat Jumping provides in-battle maneuverability, a little more defense and much cheaper Immobilization protection than Cloak of Darkness. But the important aspect is Acrobatics. Dark Armor's greatest gap is that it has absolutely no protection from knockback/knockdown. Unless you want to get thrown around by everybody and their mother, you need that protection. Acrobatics is the most effective way to get that, although you can still get some if you instead go for the Flight pool and use Hover. However, this significantly reduces your in-battle maneuvering speed unless you three slot it with speed SOs. Even then, the Acrobatics route is likely more effective overall. But - personal choice.

The Fighting pool is also one I recommend. Boxing provides a good replacement for Brawl as your fury maintenance attack - virtually identical in recharge, animation time and endurance use, but with double the damage and a small disorient chance. Tough is also handy, letting you surpass 50% resistance for both Smashing and Lethal (and giving you better than 50% resist to the three most common damage types in the late game).

Other pools are of less utility and honestly, you don't have a huge amount of room to work with. Hasten can come in handy with the slow recharge of your attacks, but I found on Test that the extra endurance usage was too troublesome. Some Stone Melee types swear by Air Superiority, but I found I didn't need it - great attack as it is. If you find yourself needing another attack, however, definetly grab it as the knockdown works wonderfully with the hammers.


TACTICS
or
How do I smush things?

First of all, screw 'attack chain'. For starters, they're semi-mythical anyhow, since your recharge rate is constantly being messed with both positively and negatively. But more importantly, you can't afford to stick to a rote system of attacks. Your endurance is at a premium in most cases, and you can't afford to overkill. Don't use Seismic Smash when Stone Fist will do. I found a good starting series to be Stone Fist, Brawl, Stone Mallet, Brawl, Stone Fist - it gets your fury started nicely if you don't get a boost from the alpha and lets you lead into your bigger attacks. That's an important thing to keep in mind: save your big attacks. You shouldn't run in and lead off with Seismic Slam. Let your fury get built up first, so you can get the most bang for your buck.

When planning ahead, I suggest only taking one of the three auras from DA. They don't really work with each other too well - Shroud messes up the fear of CoF, and the fear and disorient don't work well together if you run CoF and OpGloom at the same time. I personally opt for OpGloom, as it has the least endurance cost and stacks beautifully with Fault - open with Fault to cushion the alpha and act as a taunt to spike your fury, then leap into the middle with OpGloom on. The two stack to disorient both minions and lieutenants, making it easy to smear the spawn after that. CoF, however, is a good second option, as the 20% accuracy debuff provides more consistent mitigation alone. Shroud is best if you just want damage damage damage - the damage from it IS affected by fury, by the way.

Seismic Smash is best saved for 'hard' targets - bosses and highly dangerous/troublesome lieutenants. Using it on a minion is almost always a waste. The damage is great, but the hold is the big issue - the ability to insta-hold anything you want shouldn't be underestimated. Despite what I said earlier, I do sometimes lead off with Seismic. Simply because nothing turns a hard fight into a cakewalk like running in and holding the Paragon Protector before it even knows you're there.

Slotting is a sensitive subject. This is a tight pair of powers simply because of how many slots are demanded to succeed. Everything's very hungry. For your attacks, I suggest slotting first an accuracy, then an endurance reduction, then another accuracy before you touch the damage. Fury will keep your damage respectable - you need that endurance and that accuracy. One slotting most of your shields for endurance is okay, since you'll rarely be running them all at once. Initially you should probably just leave all those slots full of endurance reducers - you won't get good return on increased resists until you at least get to DOs, possibly beyond.

SAMPLE BUILD
or
lol u not slot right moran noob lol

Disclaimer: This is simply my own build, which I've found to be decently effective for the way I play. It might not work so well for you. You might have different priorities or a different style. Don't stick to this like a bible, use it to help you along. Please also note that I'm a PvE player - at this point, I refuse to touch PvP with how utterly broken it is. This build, thus, may or may not be any good in PvP.

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Exported from Ver: 1.7.6.0 of the CoH_CoV Character Builder - (http://sherksilver.coldfront.net/index.php)
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Name:
Level: 50
Archetype: Brute
Primary: Stone Melee
Secondary: Dark Armor
---------------------------------------------
01)--> Stone Fist==> Acc(1) Acc(3) Dmg(7) Dmg(13) Dmg(15)
01)--> Dark Embrace==> EndRdx(1) DmgRes(5) DmgRes(17) DmgRes(29)
02)--> Stone Mallet==> Acc(2) EndRdx(3) Acc(7) Dmg(11) Dmg(15) Dmg(33)
04)--> Heavy Mallet==> Acc(4) EndRdx(5) Acc(9) Dmg(11) Dmg(13) Dmg(33)
06)--> Murky Cloud==> EndRdx(6) DmgRes(9) DmgRes(17) DmgRes(29)
08)--> Swift==> Run(8)
10)--> Obsidian Shield==> EndRdx(10) DmgRes(27) DmgRes(27) DmgRes(34)
12)--> Combat Jumping==> Jump(12)
14)--> Super Jump==> Jump(14)
16)--> Health==> Heal(16)
18)--> Seismic Smash==> Acc(18) EndRdx(19) Acc(19) Dmg(23) Dmg(23) Dmg(33)
20)--> Stamina==> EndMod(20) EndMod(21) EndMod(21)
22)--> Acrobatics==> EndRdx(22) EndRdx(40)
24)--> Dark Regeneration==> Acc(24) Acc(25) EndRdx(25) EndRdx(43) Rechg(46)
26)--> Boxing==> Acc(26) Acc(34) Dmg(36) Dmg(36) Dmg(36)
28)--> Cloak Of Darkness==> EndRdx(28)
30)--> Tough==> EndRdx(30) DmgRes(31) DmgRes(31) DmgRes(31) EndRdx(40)
32)--> Tremor==> Acc(32) Acc(34) Dmg(37) Dmg(37) Dmg(37)
35)--> Oppressive Gloom==> Acc(35) Acc(39)
38)--> Fault==> Acc(38) Acc(39) Rechg(39) Rechg(40) DisDur(43) DisDur(43)
41)--> Web Envelope==> Acc(41) Acc(42) Rechg(42) Rechg(42)
44)--> Disruptor Blast==> Acc(44) EndRdx(45) Acc(45) Dmg(45) Dmg(46) Dmg(46)
47)--> Death Shroud==> Acc(47) Dmg(48) Dmg(48) Dmg(48) EndRdx(50) EndRdx(50)
49)--> Teleport Foe==> Acc(49) Acc(50)
---------------------------------------------
01)--> Sprint==> Run(1)
01)--> Brawl==> Acc(1)
01)--> Fury==> Empty(1)
02)--> Rest==> Rechg(2)
---------------------------------------------

[ QUOTE ]
a) stand in awe of your pathetic whipped-dog mentality, that you mewl about how far up the [censored] we COULD have taken it, or

b) stand in awe of your diabolically devious wielding of sarcasm.


[/ QUOTE ]

Or c) I like the fact that the least useful (to me, at least) aspect of the power has been toned down - actually improving it for my usage of it - in a way that will stop the massive nerf-herding of the power while still leaving me with an extremely useful tool. For some of us, we use it for the debuff (in which case it's still quite effective) instead of the repel. A different playstyle doesn't mean I'm a simpering lapdog, and your statement of that really just makes you out to be a fool.

Sheesh, if you want to start a fight, at least insult my mother or something. Try harder.

My main is a Storm. I love Storm. It makes me happy in my happy places. I'm also not only not going to complain about this nerf, but I'm going to take it and run gleefully.

Why? Simple.
1) With the I7 changes, the drop in the to-hit debuff really isn't going to be significant.
2) I don't *want* the enemy repelled out of the area of my debuff effects.
3) Any time I'm in a situation where I really want to push something away from me, the knockback does just fine - if not from Hurricane, then from the bajillion other effects I have that cause it.
4) This reduction in power will help weed out the weak ones and force the people who relied on it as a crutch to use the rest of their tools in Storm's powerful and wonderful toolkit instead of becoming dependent on a single power.
5) Now I can stop listening to everybody and their mother who PvPs whine like a small child about how much they hate Hurricane and how much they're looking forward to seeing it nerfed because they're too poor of players to figure out ways to beat it. (And there are ways. Many, many ways.)
6) The power is still viable, still effective, and still worthy of being called Storm Summoning's signature power. This isn't the nerfing Regen got. This isn't the massive drop in power tankers have taken from the many, many nerfs they've been on the recieving end of. This isn't even the slightly-worse-than-a-papercut dropoff a lot of blasters took this same patch with the loss of Whirlwind negating animation times. I *LIKE* this nerf because we could have gotten a heck of a lot worse, and I'm very thankful that, while I don't love the change and think there are better ways it could have been handled, things could have been much, much worse.

[ QUOTE ]
As someone once said in a thread about Hurricane in the PvP forum, Hurricane isnt overpowered, the brains of those who want it nerfed are underpowered.

[/ QUOTE ]

Amen. Hurricane is perfectly beatable in PvP. Except if you're an idiot who's tactics consist of "BLARG CHAAAAAARGE" and blindly run repeatedly into it without any form of knockback protection or a teammate to assist. My stormer can and is defeated in PvP by melee ATs. How? Because they play smart. It isn't an 'I win' button. It's a tool for weeding out the stupid.

As much as I hate to say it, the general public opinion is right. _Castle_, I think we all applaud you for your work here and openness in both answering our questions and in finding problems. But the list of 'by design' comments is very worrying. There seem to be a significant number of Defender primary sets and powers that are simply being written off as okay that Controllers can use them as well or better. If that is by design, I (and seemingly many others) question what logic was put into designing them that way. Poor Forcefield is obviously getting the worst of it - with half the powers, it's 'just fine' that a Defender is no better or worse than a Controller? If we're supposed to be worse at using mezzes and better with buffs/debuffs, why are our sets being saddled with so many mezzes and effects that aren't buffs/debuffs that aren't supposed to have a difference? I don't believe most of the complaints on that topic are directed at you, but more at the design logic that, by your statements, seems to suggest that we're being given primary powers that are purposely reduced to the strength of being secondaries, while others who have those same powers as secondaries are being given primary-equivalent levels of strength. I think we're all justified in being put out by this, and in questioning if it's viable design logic.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Then we repeal the hated stealth nerf.

The 'hated' stealth nerf? What of the 'hated' I5 and ED nerfs?


[/ QUOTE ]

Fear and anger in this young padawan I sense....

[/ QUOTE ]

Gotta love people. 'I hate you and everything you stand for, you're a liar who is just trying to profiteer off of us and hates the players, you should have your cat eaten by a Troll for all the terrible things you've done to us! Just for that, I'm only going to continue to pay you money for at least several months more, until somebody else makes a game, at which point I may or may not go over there and complain about theirs instead! SO THERE!'.