The_Hegemon

Last night, I had a moment of awesome on my Stalker.

DM/Nin at 50, fairly complete IO build, on the new Reichsman TF. On the last mission, ambushes got a little insane, Reichs stunned and defeated our brute and proceeded to wipe the team amid a massive nazi invasion. Being the only one left alive, I said 'Kuji-In Phase Shift and Run!' and did just that. Only I stopped when I realized Reichsman wasn't chasing me.

'Well, I'm just going to die anyway. Might as well take as many of them down as I can,' I thought. So I opened up on a minion, killed him in one shot, got some aggro, and went to town.

Now, there were a lot of them. But not enough to take me down. They kept coming, I kept killing them. Whenever I started to get overwhelmed, I'd throw blinding powder in their faces, hit Sha if necessary, and keep killing.

Had to pop a few inspirations here and there, but with the rate I was cutting through them, that was no problem. The pile of bodies at my feet was truly epic. I couldn't really move, since there were just too many, but it didn't matter. There were enough to kill me through sheer force of arms, but intelligent use of BP, Sha, and Shadow Meld kept me alive.

That's probably the most super I've felt on a melee character. One ninja vs. 1000 nazis? Forget the failsafe. They didn't stand a chance. My Stalker is murder on legs.

Yeah. This is the first Stalker I've played through since they buffed them, and they're much, much better now. In a team, I treat them like I treat Scrappers. They're fire-and-forget damage. You don't have to babysit them or worry about them, mostly, as they've got the tools to take care of themselves. They exist, they kill things, and they're good at it. And when things get overwhelming, the demoralize debuff and chance for fear in AS can make a big difference. And the more teammates you get on the team, the better they do.

Playing one, I really notice the crit chance going up when I've got a lot of friends around. Stalkers definitely have a place in PvE groups. They do great damage, and that damage is always on. They aren't really dependent on conditions to kill things. Even Hidden status isn't super-important anymore, what with both placate and the chance to crit randomly outside of Hide.

Plus, they have a totally different feel compared to other melee classes. I find it more cerebral. Your choices as a player directly affect your performance as a Stalker more than they would as a Brute or a Scrapper (IMO, obviously), and I'm into that.

But yeah. tl;dr version is that they're good in groups now, and good in general, too.

I've played Gravity to 50 on a Controller and really loved the set to death. Propel is thematically cool, Wormhole is unique compared to the other sets' soft control options, and Singularity is a great pet.

But... well, I'd have to agree with the posters who've said that it's mediocre in comparison to the other sets - long animation times, a long wait for your first real soft control option, etc.. I think this is especially true for Dominators, who don't really need a ranged attack in their primary, no matter how cool it is. I liked it on my Controller because at the higher levels, it was a fire-and-forget set. I had it paired with Kinetics, so I basically just played like a Defender and concentrated on using my Kin powers effectively, throwing out area controls and stacking holds on bosses as needed. It suited my playstyle for that character.

But I couldn't see playing it on a Dom. Propel would be largely useless unless I felt like seeing my character throw a Forklift. Why bother when I have a secondary devoted to damage? Wormhole and Singularity would still be cool and good, I suppose. I could see Gravity being a decent choice for the solo player who liked to rely on Singy to lock stuff down while they focused on attacks and damage, too. But ultimately, in my opinion, it's not a set that's translated particularly well across the ATs and it could probably stand to be looked at to bring it more in line with the other sets.

But honestly, it still works. Mediocre doesn't mean non-functional. It serves its purpose as a control set. If concept is more important to you than being the best Dom out there, then go for it.

I'm having some trouble with this. Have been since this morning. I get to the login screen, put in my information, get to the server select screen without a hitch, and then get a 'Cannot connect to DBserver' message when I select my server of choice. Kind of annoying, but I'm assuming that it's temporary, or that it has something to do with a larger volume of people attempting to get on now that I15 is live.

And then sometimes, it works perfectly. No way to predict when it will or won't (that I can tell, anyway).

My 50 Dom is a Fire/Fire, and I find Hotfeet to be very good. It does quite a lot of damage over time. It's significant, even on teams.

It's also an endurance hog. Even though I'm well into permadomination, have Stamina, and have a recovery unique slotted, I still find myself running dry once in a while before Domination recharges when I have this power on. It's not a huge deal, though. I could probably move one more slot to it for a 50 endurance reduction IO and compensate for it entirely (and in fact may have to do this when the Dom changes go through).

Wouldn't skip it for anything, however. It's quality.

A couple of times. I have this weird form of One-At-A-Time-Altitis, where I will get totally hooked on a character and will neglect all the alts in my stable just to play him/her. It lasts for quite a while, usually a few months after they're 50 and have completed IO builds. Then, I'll find something else to get totally hooked on for several months.

The characters I've loved the most this way are probably my Grav/Kin Controller and my Fire/Fire Dom. In fact, I still bust out the Dom at least once a week or so (even though she's at 50 and fully purpled) just because she's that much fun to play. And the Controller is probably the most fun I've had 1-50 on any character to date.

My Rad/Rad is okay. Not amazing, but not awful, either. His attacks get the job done. He can solo at a pace that satisfies me, I just never do because I feel like that's a total waste of what he's capable of. He can take bosses and has decent fire-whenever-it's-up area damage. Debuffing is still his primary purpose, but his attacks work as well as I hoped they would, too. And they're going to get better when I get higher. So far, I'm really liking it, and I still have room to grow.

My Emp/Psy Defender, though... his secondary set is pretty useless. It's really sort of irrelevant without debuffs or self damage buffs to back it up. I don't really mind, though, because he makes such a big difference on teams.

Leveling up the Rad/Rad was a bit of a pain, though. I had many of the same hangups as the OP until around, oh... the late 20s? It wasn't until after I had a good amount of slots in the important powers that I began to feel like my damage was actually decent.

Really? Well, how are you slotted? What powers did you take and skip?

I'm 34 with my Rad/Rad Defender and am basically satisfied with my damage. And I still have a lot more damage to pick up when I fit in that sixth slot in Irradiate and Electron Haze for the Lady Grey proc. I'm fairly IO'd - though with nothing particularly bank-breaking other than a Numina unique I scored on a lucky merit roll. Probably spent, oh... 20 mil on the build so far, and have most of my stuff now. I rely more on AoE damage than ST, which really gets halfway decent when I've got all my debuffs going.

Granted, it's not amazing. I wasn't expecting it to be. But it's good enough that I feel like my damage actually does something and that my secondary powers are worth investing in.

I agree with the others who've said that -Defense is a fairly useless secondary effect after 22, except that -def as a secondary effect allows you to slot some cheap procs for extra damage, which is amplified by the resistance debuff in Radiation Emission. I often feel like my damage makes a big impact once the debuffs are out.

::shrug:: Your mileage may vary, I guess.

I've done a couple with my Widow - mostly the easier ones. Here's a pic of my Widow versus Indigo.

No temps, but I did use green pills to supplement Aid Self.

I've also done Hro'Dtohz with her, and that required a lot more luck. I died several times due to unlucky dice rolls and the fight took me a very long time when I finally managed it.

Indigo took, oh... three cycles of Elude? I find that I have to use Elude as soon as it's up or my endurance bottoms out too easily. I haven't been able to afford the second recovery unique, though, so that might solve things. I'm not holding my breath. Anyway, my basic strategy was to spam attacks until the blue bar got too low, then hit Elude, then go buck wild for three minutes until it started blinking. At this point, I hit Mind Link, placate, and recover from the end crash. Go back in with some toggles off until it's back up, hit Elude, put the second Assault back on, and continue hacking at her HP. It's not pretty and it takes a while, but it works.

I can heartily support the recommendations for DM/Ninjitsu so far. It's a highly survivable combo with the defense, the -tohit from DM to supplement this, and the two self-heals (one of which is actually a good attack, too!). The damage is also fantastic.

I've got one that I've taken to 48 so far, and she's awesome. I have a Night Widow with a completed IO build, too, and I far prefer the Stalker even though she's not soft-capped. The heals and the tricks more than make up for a few defense points, and the damage seems equivalent most of the time with bursts of much better. And she's way more end-efficient.

Overall, it's an incredibly solid combination that totally lives up to the hype it gets on these boards. It has no AoE damage whatsoever, but the tools and fantastic single-target damage make up for that.

The purpose of a Brute is Violence. And they're awesome at it. Sometimes, they do things that one might see a Tank do, like soak up incoming damage so the squishier villains don't have to. But really, this is just a means to an end - the end being keeping the pain train moving at full speed.

As has already been pointed out, roles are flexible in CoV. As a Brute, as long as you're punching the heck out of stuff, you're doing it right... and you're probably speeding up the team while soaking up damage as a bonus.

Heya,

I've soloed a bunch of AVs on my Dom, too! I'm Fire/Fire, though, and not Mind/Fire. Here are some pics, because I don't know how to make videos:

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Hro'Dtohz

Positron (posibot version)

and

Silver Mantis.

I've done a couple of others, but these are the ones I got to photobucket before my computer died last week.

Anyway, the pattern is mostly the same. If it's mezzable and doesn't have insane fire resists, you can kill it. Fire Imps actually add a lot to my damage, so I take the AV down pretty quickly - it rarely takes me more than 10-15 minutes.

I don't have Demonic, so I just use a bunch of purples to start the fight and establish the hold. I've heard that some players have had a lot of success perma-confusing the AV first, since it's a non-aggro power with a really long duration, and then moving to establish the hold. Could that minimize risk for you?

For damage, I use Blaze and Incinerate. It might just be psychological, but I find that Incinerate does more than Fire Blast and still lets me squeeze one in without making the hold come back too slowly. I do use Fire Blast when I want to squeeze in a self-buff like Domination or Fiery Embrace, though. Mostly, I just Char+Blaze+Char+Incinerate+Char+Blaze forever, throwing a Char+Domination/FE+Fire Blast+Char in there as either of those two self-buff powers come up.

For keeping the hold on, the streakbreaker is indeed your friend. As I've gotten more practice and my tactics have improved, I've found that it's a good idea to monitor my tohit rolls so I can see when Char misses, and then throw Cinders next instead of an attack. The streakbreaker forces it to it, thus maintaining the full hold I've had running and allowing me to throw another Char right away and patch things up. Even with Cinders down, I can survive one miss without the hold dropping. If I miss with Char twice in quick succession and Cinders is not up, I'm in trouble. This is rare.

Anyway, congrats on your accomplishment!

I've done a few AVs with my Night Widow. To be honest, I thought she'd be better at it than she was. She does good damage, but the Random Number Gods can sometimes make survivability a problem over the course of the entire AV fight. I've succeeded with her against Indigo and Hro'Dtohz, but tend to lose more than I win - the number of AVs I couldn't do far exceeds the number I could. Weirdly, my Dominator's a way better AV-killer than my Widow.

But yeah. It's possible to solo AVs with a Night Widow, but in my opinion, they aren't an ideal build for it.

You can indeed perma-hold AVs with a permadom. Sometimes, a miss will break the hold and you'll get massacred, assuming you're solo. But with enough recharge, you can even do enough damage to solo them. It can be pretty safe, too - my Dom is my best AV soloer.

Here are some pics:

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Lord of War

Positron

And

Silver Mantis

I'm Fire Control, though, and my hold activates a lot faster than Gravity's. I'm not sure Grav would be able to do it.

But yes. Someone should move this to the Dom forum.

Do you see the green numbers over your character's head while getting healed from this IO in PvE? Also, is it unique?

Yes.

10/12ths of my active characters have PvP builds of some kind, or are at least specced out to be PvP-capable. I like the PvP aspect of this game quite a lot.

But yeah, there are plenty of flaws with the system. It's still interesting enough to keep my attention, though.

Wow, nice!

I'm strongly considering mugging one of those Kheldian cops for a Kheld sash, though...

No, Hide+BuildUp+AS is not an 'I Win' button. Neither is Hide+Stealth+BuildUp+AS, for that matter. It isn't an invincible combo that works against everyone.

I will hold, however, that these combos are almost unbeatable in 1v1 situations vs. squishies, given enough tries. They're even close to unbeatable on a non-ideal team, where the heroes are unable to stack enough perception layers.

Yes, I know that the game isn't balanced for 1v1. It's supposed to be rather like Rock/Paper/Scissors, with some ATs being particularly strong against others. My Warshade is weak against Stalkers and strong against Masterminds, my Tank is weak against Corruptors and impervious against a single Stalker's attempts to harm him.

My perceived unfairness of Hide+Stealth+BuildUp+AS comes from the fact that, with these four powers (two of which are toggles and therefore active most of the time), a Stalker can inevitably defeat my Warshade by repeatedly attempting to BuildUp+AS me. I can escape sometimes, but all it takes is one success to kill me in a single shot.

I'm honestly stunned that you've only been AS-killed once on your squishies without respeccing for PvP. What's your secret, if you don't mind me asking? Do you only play in teams that can boost your perception, as is commonly suggested? Do you only go into the zones to fight other players, constantly keeping your guard up against Stalkers? I find myself ASed constantly, even when I do my best to avoid it, whenever I play my squishier characters.

It seems to me that I can usually avoid Stalker death if I'm concentrating solely on doing so. The moment I fight another player or engage NPCs, I'm vulnerable.

I've never won against a Stalker by myself. Ever. Stealth and Hide stacked together - a combination that really has no value in PvE apart from a tiny amount of defense - completely negates most solo characters' abilities to fight Stalkers. If you've got a +perception power in your primary or secondary, you can only see stacked stealth stalkers if you take Leadership and sacrifice two powers to do so. It seems that nobody without the leadership pool has a chance solo against stacked stealth characters.

So, no, Hide+BuildUp+AS isn't an 'I Win' button. You're 100% correct about that. There are some encounters that this combination just won't be enough to win, even if you stack stealth. There are lots of ways to make this combo fail.

The thing is, even if it fails, there's no penalty for it except for a little bit of lost endurance. If the target breaks LOS - pretty tough to do in 4 seconds - you don't even lose Hidden status. You can just wait for BuildUp to recharge and try again. With an infinite number of tries (though not, perhaps, an infinite amount of patience), you're bound to nail your target at least once. Once is enough for a lot of targets, though.

I find it really frustrating when a Stalker manages to kill me by using BuildUp and AS from Hide+Stealth status. The amount of skill involved in avoiding the AS seems astronomically higher than the skill involved in pulling it of. My reward for using several powers actively in order to prevent the AS is a stalemate, whereas the Stalker's reward for breaking through all my defenses is a risk-free one-shot kill.

That's why it seems like an 'I win' button. Four powers, two of which are toggles, trump all the powers in my squishy Warshade's 3 trays most of the time. There doesn't seem to be a difference between skilled Stalkers and unskilled Stalkers here, aside from the number of tries it takes to pull off the AS.

That's why Hide+Stealth+BuildUp+AS seems, to me, to be overpowered. But, hey, I'm probably biased. My Stalker is still just a baby. I'm not a game developer and I don't claim to see the big picture. Nor am I a PvP vet (it would be wrong of me to claim otherwise) - I just started trying it out a few weeks ago. Just tossing in my two influence. That's how it seems from the receiving end, though, and that's what my own findings seem to report.

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Saying that the you can't talk about the tools of the trade without talking about Placate basically...

Ok let's have that scenario...
2 skilled "blappers"
1 skilled defender
1 skilled stalker

personally with my stalker I would
1- Raise all defenses (I play an SR stalker)
2- (alternatively but not necessary)pop a couple of rage and insights
3- approach one of the "blappers"
4- buildup
5- activate AS
6- target the second "blapper" while AS is preparing to hit
7- chain AS with Placate to the second "blapper"...
8- chain phase shift to placate as AS hits...
9- hit TP straight up... (best defense as flight can't catch up and SS/SJ can't go there.)

What would the skilled trio do to defeat me?

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As was said, if the defender is an emp, they'd see you coming, hit BU+Aim, completely override any of your defenses and murder you in 2 seconds flat.

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As well they should. It's three on one.

Take a team without the ability to stack their perception, however. Say...

One 'blapper,' one INV/SS Tanker, one Dark/Dark defender. Would you be able to pick them off in safety? Why or why not?

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Thats a poorly made pvp team. Take your hero team and match them up against 1 sonic/dark corr, a Ninja/trick arrow Mastermind and a fire/fire dom. Who would win?

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So, some characters just won't ever be effective in PvP?

*stares at his INV/SS Tank, his Fire/Fire Dom, and his Warshade*

Still, a Stalker would be able to slaughter them in relative safety, no?

(If it's three on one, I would hope that the Sonic/Dark Corr, the Ninja/TA MM, and the Fire/Fire dom would win against my INV/SS Tank.)

Edit: Replaced the word 'builds' with 'characters.'

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Saying that the you can't talk about the tools of the trade without talking about Placate basically...

Ok let's have that scenario...
2 skilled "blappers"
1 skilled defender
1 skilled stalker

personally with my stalker I would
1- Raise all defenses (I play an SR stalker)
2- (alternatively but not necessary)pop a couple of rage and insights
3- approach one of the "blappers"
4- buildup
5- activate AS
6- target the second "blapper" while AS is preparing to hit
7- chain AS with Placate to the second "blapper"...
8- chain phase shift to placate as AS hits...
9- hit TP straight up... (best defense as flight can't catch up and SS/SJ can't go there.)

What would the skilled trio do to defeat me?

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As was said, if the defender is an emp, they'd see you coming, hit BU+Aim, completely override any of your defenses and murder you in 2 seconds flat.

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As well they should. It's three on one.

Take a team without the ability to stack their perception, however. Say...

One 'blapper,' one INV/SS Tanker, one Dark/Dark defender. Would you be able to pick them off in safety? Why or why not?

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I think your first issue is a common one, and the root of most peoples problems, even today. Stalkers are hard for most AT's to fight 1v1. The problem with this is that PvP is team balanced.

1 Stalker versus 1 Blaster....Stalker wins most of the time

2 Stalkers versus 1 Blaster and 1 Emp.....about even

3 Stalkers versus 2 Blasters and 1 Emp....Blasters win most of the time

This is provided that both sides have decent PvP builds and equal skill levels.

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Yes, you're right. Stalkers are incredibly hard for anyone to fight 1 on 1. In 1v1 combat, the Stalker will win most of the time because of the way they're designed. This, to me, seems to be the entire reason why so many players perceive Stalkers as being unfair. They are balanced vs. teams, since ASing a squishy next to his two friends is a death-sentence. The question I pose is this: is that alright? Is it OK to have one AT dominate all others in solo combat?

Most Stalkers will say 'Yes, this is perfectly alright. I'm balanced on teams (they do seem to be), so the situation is OK as is. If you can't defeat me solo, that's by design.' Solo Squishies will say 'This isn't fair at all. Stalkers will always win against me no matter what I do unless I rebuild my character. Even then, I'll have to accept that they're still going to win almost every time. (This does seem to be the case for most squishy ATs and powerset combinations)'

Neither position is intrinsically right or wrong. If the game is designed to provide balanced solo encounters, Stalkers are grossly overpowered. If the game isn't designed for solo play, Stalkers are just fine.

Everything else is a matter of opinion. Personally, I don't get enjoyment out of being slain by the burst-damage ATs again and again in PvP just because I can't find a team. I don't like not being able to do much more than make myself a difficult target. People like solo PvP. That's why there are so many Stalkers, Scrappers, and Blappers in the zone - they're the best designed to fight other players and win in solo encounters.

If it's the case that PvP will never be balanced 1 on 1, then that system is strongly discouraging to a large portion of the player base. If it's the case that certain ATs negate each other (My Tank stands no chance against a competent Corruptor, for example), then there's no perceived imbalance, since players will assume that the game is Rock/Paper/Scissors in solo play. Everything changes on teams, of course.

So... is this alright? Should I have to stay the heck away from Siren's Call if it's just me and a Stalker in the zone? If this is the case, I'd really like someone with authority to clear it up for me. I'm fairly certain of what the player opinions will be - they're expressed in the dozens of Stalker-related threads on these boards.

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A good PvP player can pick any build and be a force.

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Many, many things frustrate me about Stalkers. I hate that they can take four powers - Hide, AS, Build Up, and Stealth - and automatically win most solo battles in which the hero doesn't have the leadership pool. With those four powers, I am robbed of any chance to fight back.

Maybe the fault isn't theirs. I've built a Stalker and am trying to play him in order to get a feel for how they work. Maybe I'll eventually decide that it's not the case that 'Stalkers are Easy Mode' and instead come to the conclusion that 'I suck' or 'Tri-Form Warshades are Hard Mode.'

I hate that Stalkers with stacked stealth completely negate every single power in my primary and secondary. When they stack stealth, I will never see them coming. Nobody will, unless they're on a team with a +perception buff or if they're playing a powerset with an inbuilt +perception buff in addition to two powers from the Leadership set.

I have four powers that work against Stalkers, all of which I have to be in Human form to use. They are Orbiting Death, Shadow Cloak, Inky Aspect, and Nebulous Form. For those of you that aren't familiar with Warshades, Orbiting Death is a non-autohit damage aura, Shadow Cloak is a stealth power with +perception, Inky Aspect is a PBAoE disorient toggle, and Nebulous Form is a better version of Phase Shift. Here's what I do:

I travel to the hotspot in Nova Form and immediately phase, so as to get my toggles up in safety. If Heroes control the zone, I use IR goggles. If they don't, I'm SOL. So, I've got all my toggles up. I dart around the Longbow blob, looking like a tool, because I can't be sure of whether there's a Stalker around or not. Then, I start seeing phantom 'miss' messages from my damage aura and disorient toggle. I RUN, usually getting out of range of the AS and teleporting to safety. I pop a few insights (If I have them. If not, SOL again) so I can see him and get past his defenses. Then, I use Gravimetric Snare, since it's DoT and I've got it slotted for two accuracies. I want him out of Hide for as long as possible. I hit him with a few attacks. Then, a couple of things might happen: he might stay and fight, beating me - I'm vulnerable the moment I shapeshift, after all. I can't keep my gimpy Stalker prevention measures up. If he uses placate while I'm in Dwarf form, I'm screwed. I can't run away quick enough to avoid the inevitable AS and the Dwarf teleport leaves me rooted for juuuust long enough for the Stalker to pull it off (incidentally, this is why I think Stalkers should have to make two range checks). A stalker using all of his tricks will always - 100% of the time - be able to defeat me in 1vs1 battles.

(This is fine! Stalkers are the 'can-opener' AT for my squiddy kind. I don't have a problem with that. I do have a problem with the notion that they're able to do this with just four powers, however.)

The other thing they might do is run away. I'll jump into Nova form and harass them for a while, but they always escape. I have never been able to beat a Stalker on my own, even ones that I have an unfair SO advantage over. Then, I'll head back to the Longbow clump and try again, running all the toggles that I've been running. Inevitably, the Stalker comes back. If I'm out of insights, then I'm dead. Perfect Stealth is a Perfect Defense.

All an enemy has to do is run Hide & Stealth, Click Build Up, and attempt to AS me. If it fails, run away. If not, they've just killed me. Please try to see it from my perspective - I'm trying as hard as I can to see it from yours! With four powers, a Stalker is able to defeat me 100% of the time. A poor, unskilled Stalker is one that I can force into a stalemate, either by using Nebulous Form or running away. Even then, they can come back and repeat the same tactic ad nauseam until they get a success. With an infinite number of tries, they'll succeed eventually.

However hard AS is to pull off now, there's no penalty for messing it up. So what if it took you five tries? It's not as if those four failures got you killed.

Maybe this is OK. I have no idea, after all. I'm not a game developer. I'd just like to see a Siren's Call that isn't always Scrappers/Blappers vs. Stalkers, with no other ATs standing a chance unless they build in a specific, cookie-cutter manner.

(For those of you that might be wondering, IR goggles do let me see Stalkers if I stack it with Shadow Cloak. I still lose all of my encounters unless the Stalker absolutely refuses to use other powers (then he'll just leave me alone), but I don't mind, since I actually got a chance to fight back.)

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Since AS is practically a melee snipe, shouldn't it follow the rules for snipe attacks and have it's range and line of sight checked twice? Once when the attack is initiated and once when it is resolved. Not like now, when people can start up AS and kill someone 100 feet away because the target moved.

If not, can someone tell me how to interrupt a stalker running Elude or similar powers? It's impossible to hit them even if I can see them perfectly fine.

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This has been brought up a couple times internally. The problem with making AS check Range twice is that it would be virtually impossible to land in PvP. It would also make it unique in that all other melee powers only check range once, so even if your target is running, you will still land the attack, no matter how far away they get.

It DOES check line of sight twice, so if you constantly take routes which break LOS frequently, you can stop Assassin attacks.

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Alright... why would it be virtually impossible to land in PvP? If you're going to hit a target with a power that takes off most of their HP in one shot, drops two toggles, and is 6/7 irresistible, shouldn't it be hard to pull off?

If the person you're about to assassinate knows you're there, and you're trying to use an ultimate attack that requires to target to be unaware of your presence, shouldn't they be able to escape unless you take actions to prevent it?

Many of the Stalker sets are given tools to prevent their victims from escaping. Stun, Cobra Strike, and impale come to mind. Why doesn't the Stalker have to use all the tricks available to him/her in order to earn the massive one-shot?

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I'm almost certain we'll disagree, though. I see it as a balance issue as well as a concept issue, so this is all a matter of my opinion.

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From a hypothetical concept PoV, I actually agree. The problem is that all melee attacks work this way. Just like a ranged attack will go around corners to hit you, which is pretty funny if you take the time to watch the animation. Impale has a fairly slow animation to the target, and if you are trying to hit someone who is very good at movement the attack ends up following them like some sort of homing missle made of spines. What I am getting at is that there is no active dodging in this game. Once the attack begins (except interruptable ones) a "roll" is made. It doesn't matter what you do, once the "roll" indicates a hit, one will land, even it should be impossible for it to. Thats why you can jump up with a ranged attack toggled on target you can't get LoS on and have the attack go through. Logically, that attack should fail, since the game will show you shooting through a rail or a floor.

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Good point. From the standpoint of the game engine, however, as soon as you begin your attack animation, the attack has already been computed. The behind-the-scenes math has already been done; if you've hit, you've still got to go through the animation of hitting them before it connects. Your target is already damaged, he just doesn't know it yet.

With Snipe/AS, however, the computation hasn't taken place yet. Actions that you take have an effect on the success or failure of the attack. The attack itself doesn't take place until after the interruptible period, which is why it should check for range at the end. If it checked for range only at the end, though, Stalkers would be able to deplete their endurance bar by continually trying and failing to activate the power. That's just not fair.

Now that I think about it, though, the second range check should be a bit farther away. Perhaps double the distance of the first, approximately the distance of Knockout Blow from the Superstrength set (which is longer than the rest of the attacks). That way, stunned opponents wouldn't be able to stagger away in escape. They shouldn't be able to, since they're technically defenseless, and that's exactly the situation in which AS should succeed.

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I agree that AS should have two range checks. It's not realistic concept-wise to get hit with a devatating and interruptable melee attack when you're traveling across the zone. Movement should be a valid tactic for avoiding an Assassin Strike. If I get placated, I know what's coming, and my first instinct is to run away. In practice, this isn't the correct thing to do. You should try to break LoS within three seconds or interrupt the AS. Running away should actually work for such a powerful attack.

I do have a question, however: does Snipe, the closest analogue to AS, make a second range check?

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Movement IS a valid tactic to avoid assassin strike, and it works quite well. If you get placated, don't stand there and wait, you should immediately begin to move around erratically until the effect wears off.

And no, snipe does not have a second range check, in my experience. I've sniped hellions that ran outside of normal snipe range. If they turn the corner or jump behind a fence, the snipe fails.

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Movement _is_ an effective counter, however not straightline run for the hills movement. If you need a concept, think about this, if you run away from an assasin in a straight line, you have just given him an excellent open shot at your unprotected back.

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Yes, I've just given him an open shot at my back. He's not taking a shot, though. He's trying to hit me with his sword/claws/pom-poms. It's a melee attack that takes time to prepare and execute. That's what the Stalker is doing when he starts to squat. If I'm out of the effective range of the attack when he's done preparing for it, he shouldn't be able to pull it off. The Assassin Strike is allowed to be as effective as it is because it's supposed to take skill to set up and it's not supposed to be easy to pull off if your opponent knows it's coming.

I'm almost certain we'll disagree, though. I see it as a balance issue as well as a concept issue, so this is all a matter of my opinion.

Edit: Snipe is also allowed to be as powerful as it is because it takes time to prepare. If you're attacked, it'll be interrupted. It should also fail if the target leaves the range of the attack for the same reason. In reality, though, this wouldn't change much; Snipe has a long range.

I agree that AS should have two range checks. It's not realistic concept-wise to get hit with a devatating and interruptable melee attack when you're traveling across the zone. Movement should be a valid tactic for avoiding an Assassin Strike. If I get placated, I know what's coming, and my first instinct is to run away. In practice, this isn't the correct thing to do. You should try to break LoS within three seconds or interrupt the AS. Running away should actually work for such a powerful attack.

I do have a question, however: does Snipe, the closest analogue to AS, make a second range check?