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Quote:See my comment on flight simulators and "But its an awesome driving game" above.I use Ninja Run most of the time when I need to move around almost every zone except the Shadow Shard ... and even then, I'm using the Geysers for movement that's faster than Teleport and keeping my Teleport in reserve so as to "land" on floating rocks that the Geysers hurl me at (and seem determined to MISS...).
On my WS, Teleport is my backup mode of travelling.
I don't care if I can pick superspeed or superjump or get by on ninja leap. Its NOT flight. You can not be a WS and soar through the air unless you're a squid. THAT is so much of a deal-breaker for me the AT holds zero interest for me.
I also have never been able to get a tanker past level 16 or a defender past level 32 (admittedly this was before the recent solo damage buff so I may have to go back and try them again) or any but my first blaster (my first toon ever) past level 3.
What I enjoy are PB's, Scrappers, Controllers, and MM's in approximately that order... and there's NOTHING wrong with that. -
Quote:Ironically, I can survive x6 spawns of Malta and Carnies on my 50 PB without too much trouble. Of course I ignored any and all guides and just built for what I felt was important and kinda lucked into something that laughs at large spawns of Rikti, Malta, and Carnies (and most everything else).I consulted guides. I burned respecs. I bought IOs. I double, triple, quadruple checked to make sure that I have the right powers, the right slots, the right tactics. For whatever reason, it does not work for me. If I try to fight x4 Arachnos, I die. If I try to fight x4 Malta, I die. If I try to fight x4 Carnies, I die.
But just because I CAN doesn't mean I do. Mainly because it is a boring slog that takes probably 2-5 minutes per spawn to finally beat stuff into submission. Spending over an hour solo on an instanced mission dealing with all that chaos just isn't fun. At. All.
So I usually play at x2 and can actually use forms other than dwarf/lightform while dealing with spawns. Its a LOT a more fun that way. -
Quote:QFT.Which is fine. Not everyones suited for every AT. Some defenders can solo GM's. I personally can't and don't want to try and force myself to do it. I'm a melee player at heart.
I love my PB and I have never been able to get a WS past about level 6 and I've tried at least a dozen times... sometimes using various guides that ultimately don't help because the problem I have is far more fundamental.
The reason? I HATE HATE HATE teleport (even with the point and shoot mouse bind) and I don't want to have to be a squid to fly (which is my preferred travel power by roughly eleventy billion percent). All of the "phenominal cosmic power" fails in the face of a movement platform I can't stand.
It's roughly the equivalent of saying "I like flight simulators" and being given a driving game because "its an awesome driving game." But I don't LIKE driving games, no matter how awesome. I like flight simulators. They're completely different things. -
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For you. I happen to like it just fine. Though I more typically use it as part of a bolt, blast bolt, eyes, bolt, blast, et cetera chain. Its up after every attack that I make without the need for insane +recharge in my build (because the primary focus of my build is ranged/energy/negative defense which vastly helps my survivability).
Which again highlights the importance of the cottage rule. What is not a big deal to you is a big deal to others... which is why all of my suggestions are for additions or flat-out improvements to the existing powers, not weakening them in some area (that someone else might find important) in order to add a buff elsewhere.
If the argument is that PB damage is too weak then it makes no sense to argue that we need longer recharge times to justify increasing the damage. We just need more damage at the SAME recharge. My suggestion is to add damage via a stacking resistance debuff because that would also allow the PB to give back something to an entire team (as would a to hit and/or regen debuff if necessary to get things balanced), but if you really wanted to you could just flat out increase the damage and leave it at that (I think that would be a bit boring though).
Quote:AH proc can definitely improve your DPS but I would put it in several human attacks so you don't have to keep spamming Bolt just to wait for it to proc.
Or more simply... I don't play like you and you don't play like me... and that's perfectly acceptable.
Quote:I can't afford Apocalypse damage proc so I won't even go into it.
Quote:My favorite attack in human form is actually Radian Strike. It's fast and does decent damage.
This again comes down to differences in playstyle. I came into the PB from the perspective of my first 50... a pre-I6 fire/energy blaster where the first two fire attacks had base recharges of 2.18 and 4 seconds (vs. the 4 and 8 seconds of the other blaster types). Before that I had made it to level 20 on a tanker with super-strength (with 2 and 4 seconds recharges for its first two attacks as well). My favorite scrapper currently is a claws/willpower (1.7 and 3.2 second recharges for the first two attacks).
In short, I gravitate to powersets with very rapidly recharging attacks. It is my preferred playstyle. You are suggesting taking away one of the things that I most love about the Peacebringer because you don't think its a big deal. But my existance proves that others do think its a big deal. For me doubling the recharge times would be a deal-breaker that would have me quit PB's and possibly even the game as its my PB main that keeps me playing consistantly (all my other toons are filler).
And that's why the devs have the cottage rule. We bought into certain power sets with certain playstyles that were available to us. Making those powers work differently (ex. changing a set from weaker rapidfire attacks to slower higher damage attacks) can ruin our entire conception of a character that we may have put hundreds (if not thousands as is the case with my PB) of hours into. Wasting hundreds or thousands of hours of someone's time does NOT make them happy.
So if you want to argue that the damage should be increased, I won't disagree. But saying some other aspect of the powers should be worsened as part of the deal is something that I could not possibly hate and reject more.
If you can't guess by my likely over-repetition of certain points above, I feel VERY strongly about this point. -
Quote:I don't think you have to worry. Unless someone has an ownership stake in a business, turnover at all levels of an organization is inevitable and, in the long run, a good thing.
Rumors on posi leaving and the older devs gone now does have me a bit worried thaat by the time we get to fully be an incarnate we wont have much of a game left and frankly im only here after all these years for the high lvl content..if it gets pushed aside I wont stick around
While legacy code can be a PITA if its not documented properly, most creative endevors... especially one with as massively varied an audience as this one... benefit from getting fresh pairs of eyes looking at them. If the old hands say that something is utterly impractical or impossible, let someone new take a look at it and they might find a way to make it work. This game benefited immensely from getting out from under Jack's original concepts (players don't need to know hard numbers... three minions should be a challenge... etc), and who knows what ideas some new hand might come up with that might make the game even better?
As long as the turnover happens at a measured pace (i.e. senior people stepping aside so that the rungs beneath them can move up the ladder and make room for new hires at the bottom) this is the healthiest model for an ongoing business that plans to be in the business for the long haul. -
Quote:Then let me suggest, as an alternative, Kinetic Melee/Willpower as a possibility... especially if survivability is the goal. Like claws it has a strong PBAoE, a knockback cone, and a short single target ranged attack (which combined with darkness mastery has allowed me to create a respectable ranged attack chain for my scrapper).Firstly, I must thank everyone for the wonderful input, yours is certainly the art within the science. I have enjoyed reading though the various suggestions and intellectual offerings here.
With much respect to the Claw aficionados, I must disqualify that particular set from the running on thematic grounds. I know that this particular board lends itself to performance over appearance in many ways and I do not dispute the attractive features of the Claw set. I just find that it visually and thematically leaves me cold.
But the big advantage of KM in terms of survivability are that the main attacks in the chain inflict a damage debuff on your targets (which can be stacked to about -20% to -25% in my experience) which stacks very nicely with Willpower's multilayered mitigation by providing it in yet another form.
Likewise, KM has the advantage that all of its attack either inflict knockdown (including the PBAoE and ranged attack), stun, or both to the point that it is quite possible to keep a boss continuously stunned or flat on his back (or both)... and every second you can keep the foes around you from attack is another second for the set's regen to act as mitigation.
While you stated that Willpower seemed only faintly praised, I have to say that for your purposes (survivability without panic buttons) Willpower is probably your top tier choice as, with the exception of the self-rez and the easily skippable "crashless" teir-9, the set is entirely toggle and autopower based... as close to fire and forget defenses as you can possibly get.
The final advantage of Willpower from my personal experience is that it offers protection from a number of more exotic attack types (such as stealth/perception debuffs, confuse, and fear) and offers good defense/resistance against psionic damage which is prominant in the late game.
It also has its own built in super-stamina so that you never need worry about endurance (with three slotted stamina and quick recovery you're looking at 3.5 End/sec recovery before adding in additional set bonuses or endurance boosting accolades).
Willpower is one of those sets where the whole is more than the sum of its parts, but that also means there's not a lot that's skippable either. But with Fitness now inherant you can easily pick up the whole array without sacrificing any of the primary attacks and its rather unique version of build up.
On a purely cosmetic note, the default gold color of both KM's attacks and WP's auras look great with each other without any need for customization. The only thing that might get to you are KM's sound effects, but I actually found them useful in that, after a little experience I could tell which attack I was using just by the pitch changes in the "revving engine" and the Tai-Chi inspired animations make the set feel very dynamic (and perfect if you've got some sort of combat spellcaster theme in mind as I did).
So that's my pitch for Kinetic Melee/Willpower as the sets for you. -
Quote:And such changes would probably make me /ragequit my PB. The incredibly quick recharge on gleaming bolt makes it a great carrier for procs (I have both the Achilles Heel defense debuff, and the Apocalypse damage proc in it) and its cast time (1s) plus recharge (.53s) on my build is actually LESS than the activation time of my other human-form ranged attacks (which have 1.67s activation times).1. Glinting Eye: 4s attack with 1.67 recharge. I would move it to 6s recharge and maybe Gleaming Blast to 10s and Bolt to 3s. Maybe they can do what they did for Energy Assault for Dominator.
When you're able to fire off a proc between 20-40 times per minute (depending on whether I stick it between my other attacks or just set it to auto) you're looking at a sustained resistance debuff of between 15% to 26% (the average amount over the course of a minute or more with the actual value swinging between 0% and 40+% from a possible multi-stack) while the damage proc is adding 700 to 1500 damage per minute to your chain (more when you consider that the debuff is taking place at the same time) because its going off so often.
It is my personal experience using the resistance debuff proc in such a rapidfire power and how significantly it effected my damage output (I went from 64.3 DPS to 89.3 DPS with my human form ranged attack chain just by adding those two procs) that led to my suggestion of adding a resistance debuff to all the PB's attacks as a means of both buffing damage and allowing it to "give back" more to the team.
Indeed, the more I've pondered ways to buff PB's while sticking to the cottage rule, the more I think answer to the problem is to add stacking debuffs to it via its attacks because this not only helps the PB, it also allows the PB to "give back" to the team (via debuffing foes) while not changing how it goes about doing so (i.e. blasting them to hell and back).
So if adding a resistance debuff isn't enough of a boost, then lets looks at adding some others. Brilliant light blinding a target makes sense, so adding a to-hit debuff (on top of defense and resistance) to the equation would not only help a PB's surivability but the teams as well (especially if nova form is spamming its AoE's on whole mobs). Likewise, the plasma blasts of the Praetorian clockwork inflict a regeneration debuff (as opposed to ongoing damage... both simulating that you're continuing to burn) so if those aren't enough throw in some minor amount of that as well.
The idea being that while a PB is blasting away they're helping the team by making each foe they strike a softer target for both the PB and their team to deal with and the debuffs can be tuned up or down relatively innocuously until the devs get the balance they feel is best for them... all the while keeping the current playstyle fundamentally unchanged for those who are happy with things as they are.
Quote:The problem is human form could be (or it already is?) doing more damage than the Squid form? Squid form is supposed to do the most damage? -
Quote:Not directly, no.IO's really won't help you much when it comes to Mez resistance. Definitely get a -KB IO, though. My suggestion is to play like a Blapper, and you'll do great.
But the vast majority of lasting mez effects (a half-second stun isn't usually an issue for a Kheld) in this game fall under the ranged positional defense (with some few AoE) and are either psionic, energy, or negative energy for type defense.
Loading up on IO sets like Thunderstrikes and Makos Bites with their Ranged/Energy/Negative Energy defense buffs mean that those mez effects land and deliver their mez effects far less often and a couple of break-frees can handle the rest. As an added bonus the ranged and energy defense is also effective against Sappers and Voids/Quantums.
Is a human-form Kheld build ever going to be top-tier? Unlikely. But for a concept build of an Iron Man like character it should more than cover you. -
I did something like this back in i6 days when, for story reasons (they were on a long term deep cover assignment), my MM switched sides. Since MM's were not available hero-side I needed a new AT for them.
As part of the lore, the bots and light armor suit the MM used had been designed by her brainiac sister who was conducting all manner of research into quantum fluctuations, vacuum energy, and the zero point field. She even developed a prototype suit for herself (Rad/Rad defender) before jumping at the chance to bond with a Kheldian and feel the quantum fluctuations first hand.
Subsequent to that, she used her increased understanding to improve on the "Zephyr" (ZPR-1... Zero Point Radiation, Mk I)... giving it capabilities similar to a human-form PB and gave it to the former MM to use in the field.
It worked pretty well in that sense... part of what made it easier on other RP-types was that the armor was actually Kheldian-based technology. Capability-wise the lack of mez protection was noticable, but I built up my IO sets for ranged defense (which most mez effects fall under) and that helped quite a bit (as I recall I was pretty close to the soft cap for ranged defense).
Just to finish the story though... once i18 went live, the PPD FINALLY cleared the use of my MM's bots (which had been sitting in storage for over four years by this point) inside Paragon city limits and the Zephyr suit has since been gathering dust... for now. Who knows when some situation will come up where it will be needed again though. -
Personally, I think a lot of customization could be accomplished with relatively few new options. Let's say, for example, that we came up with two alternate textures (a smoother texture and one that is rougher) for each of the forms, and also allowed two alternate sizes as well (a small, medium, and large... with large as the current size and about six feet as the small size for dwarf).
That would create nine different combinations for each form, and 81 possible combinations between the two forms.
Throw in even 30 color options (say indigo, blue, and a blueish-purple in varying degrees of saturation for PB's as example) and you're at over 2400 possible combinations for the forms.
Even if you limited the Kheld to just one color choice for all of its powers overall (resonable to me since it seems all their powers are just different manifestations of the same energy), there would still be 1200 different combinations of appeareances for the forms and 30 different shades of Kheld powers overall (some would obviously not be obviously different, but for the individual Kheld just knowing you ARE different would be a big QoL improvement).
Now it could very well be that even the above level of complexity of allowing this customization is prohibitive, but even a fraction of the above (dealing with the forms via a weapon customization-like process to allow for the 9 x 9 combinations I described initially) would be something I think most Kheld lovers would get behind. -
Quote:This is probably one of the most underrated benefits of the PB.You're thinking of warshade inherent. PB's get 80% damage from being grouped with 4 tanks/defenders/MMs or corrupters (I think?). Granted, with the force multiplication the team will still be steamrolling, but PBs inherent is ment to let them fill missing rolls, rather than add to current strengths.
Between set bonuses, my own slotting, and even moderate damage buffing (a few assaults and maybe an AM) while on a team with four or more tankers/defenders/MM/corruptors has my PB sitting near or even at the damage cap in Nova form with one or the other of their AoE's going off on wide swaths of foes every three seconds for well over 200 damage per target a pop (with single target blasts in between).
By the same token, any team with three or more blaster/scrapper/brute/stalkers is going to have my dwarf form at its resistance cap with at least a 30% resistance to psychic damage to boot (better against psionic damage than anything outside of a dark armor or willpower tanker). Throw in my set bonuses for mid-thirties defense against ranged, energy, and negative energy and my strong self-heal and... for a team that lacks one... I am a passable tank.
More often I'm on a more balanced team where I can do either of those at that level of effectiveness as the needs of the group dictate at that moment.
The PB, even moreso than the WS, is designed to be at its best on a team... and the best part of the PB is that you can count on being able to bring what the team most needs. It may not be quite as good as one of the dedicated AT's but it can cover the role well enough to pull their weight on any TF I've taken mine on. -
Quote:The fundamental problem with that idea is SLOTS. If you're a tri-form you've probably already got your slots spread thin. My build has just barely enough slots to cover the necessities. Having to slot additional attacks would mean either less effective slotting on the attacks I already do have or being forced to specialize in one form or another (in which case you're better off just building a blaster or tanker or scrapper)
My initial suggestion for helping Peacebringers was to simply raise their base damage but after reading some of the fine suggestions here I'm starting to change my viewpoint. For TriFormers it makes more sense to add another attack or two to each form. But that creates a bit of a balance issue since it'll have to be weighed against Warshades' forms. And there's no way Warshade players (Myself included) won't be clamoring for added attacks of their own.
Frankly, I've never encountered this massive hole in the attack chains of my forms... and I'm not even built for recharge. In Nova form I can spam "bolt, blast, bolt, scatter, bolt, blast, bolt, detonation... repeat" without any gaps indefinitely. In dwarf form I can spam an endless "strike, smite, strike, flare, strike, smite, strike, antagonize... repeat" chain without gaps as well.
The only thing that MIGHT be needed in that regard would be an increase in recharge speed for the white dwarf flare if you felt that using your multi-target taunt power (and its 75% range debuff effect) was not an important component of playing a pocket tank.
If the PB were to see any buffing I'd much prefer it to be incremental improvements where we get a change to evaluate their effects... rather than completely changing everything at once and then having to figure out what to nerf (and possibly killing something that makes PB the AT they most prefer in the process).
That's why I am proposing only minor tweaks at this point. Things like one or more of the following;
- Add a resistance debuff to all the PB's attacks.
- Improve the recharge time on the dwarf form attacks (most specifically White Dwarf Flare) so that a full attack chain is possible with moderate slotting for recharge.
- Shorten the time that changing forms takes considerably.
- Add debuff resistance to dwarf form.
- Adjust the numbers on cosmic balance so that it adds mag 2 mez protection per controller/dominator.
- Improve the Mag on Pulsar to a solid 3.
Implement some of these and then see how they work and, if needed, then add a bit more, and keep going until you get things worked out. -
Quote:You're also using a sub-par build. You admitted that you'd gone past the ED cap on your attacks, effectively wasting an entire slot per power that could have gone into something like recharge, accuracy, or to-hit debuffs, or endredux. You overslotted stamina (4 End Mods) as well, then slotted your Nova form with even more End Mod that was completely un-needed.
Well...what a shock! I was a true pain! I couldn't believe HOW weak it has become. It's just not that it has become a lot weaker due to not 6 sloting with ACC/Damage, but also it's that ALL other toons went up in Power, due to massive IOs sets and bonuses. But the PB came all the way down.
In short, you have a horrible build that, for some reason, you expect to perform as well as an optimized IO'd build, when its actually underperforming even by SO build standards. Please fix your build so it's not wasting half your slots before claiming an AT is so horribly underpowered.
By way of contrast, my tri-form PB was built with non-wasteful slotting and a decent array of set IO's (no purple sets, but several of the rare uniques earned on the cheap via A-merits). My PB slammed through the Mender Ramiel arc without even slowing down (the Honoree was a speedbump) and has been among the most survivable when running any of the high-end TF's or raids (amusingly... even more so than a WS in one case).
Do I think PB's could use a little buffing? I wouldn't mind it, but nothing radical.
I stand by my initial suggestion that all they really need is a little resistance debuff (say a 5% debuff for 6-8 seconds on each attack) added to their attacks (either in addition to or in place of their current defense debuffs... which is not as noticable since nearly everyone is already hitting most targets 95% of the time).
This would not only allow them to do better damage (as the mag of the debuff builds with each hit), but it will also "give back" to their allies by making their attacks do more damage too. -
Quote:I think a much better solution would be to instead buff the build-up power so that it both provides a larger damage buff and lasts longer. Perhaps something more akin to the Rage power from Superstrength.tl;dr Version: Warshades' methods of buffing their own damage leave Peacebringers in the dust both in terms of the amount of the buff and its consistency. Peacebringers need an increase to their base damage to keep from being left behind. Not enough of an increase to bring them on par with Warshades but enough so as to make a Peacebringer a comparable choice for DPS when trying to decide between the two ATs. Raise the melee damage modifier to .95 and the ranged damage modifier to .90.
This is mainly because when you adjust the damage modifiers you also adjust the maximum level of damage. Right now Warshades and Peacebringers have their damage levels capped at the same level (Warshades just have an easier way of reaching those caps).
Thus, a better solution is to improve the damage buff without moving the ceiling of effectiveness (your solution would allow a PB to actually outdamage a WS if it were say, on a team with a kinetics defender/controller).
A related solution would be to add a -resist debuff to the PB's attacks (as well as the already extant -defense debuff). This would not only allow the PB to do more damage, but would also be a way to help it "give back to the team" by making all its targets squishier... effectively increasing the damage of everyone on the team against them.
Quote:I get the feeling I"m playing a different game than the people who insist that PBs need a buff. Usually when I team with a Warshade he or she ends up dying while my PB remains upright and happily plugging away. I've certainly never been on a team where I've felt out performed by a WS.
If you're on a team where you don't have a good tank or defender to help keep the team upright, a PB gets tougher to compensate. Three damage dealers on a team and you're sitting at capped resistance (and 30% resistance to PSI... bane of many a tanker) in dwarf form with no crash. By comparison the +60% damage that WS gets likely will not make that much difference since their mires (and various team buffs) already let them nearly cap their damage.
By the same token, if you're on a defense heavy team, the PB is pretty safe and gets a damage bonus to help finish foes faster (and this is a steady-state boost that does not require large mobs to maintain, so its better for AV fights). Meanwhile the WS gets even more defense which probably just means he'll cap out faster, but not get significantly better than he would otherwise be. This also means that the team may lack the Oomph to actually drop the things that are pounding on them quickly and that the WS is basically nibbled to death by ducks.
Cosmic Balance is just a much better tool for teams than its WS equivalent because it helps a PB do what the AT does best... shape-shift to fit the needs of the team its on. -
Well, since I'm already thin on slots, I'd hope that any solution to dwarf-forms low damage would be to buff the three attack powers they do have.
Personally, I'd buff the PB by increasing dwarf-form attacks' recharge so that with moderate recharge slotting you can get a full attack chain and then give all their attacks a resistance debuff effect (in addition to the defense debuff it has now) that might stack to about -15% to -20% depending on recharge rates and form (I'd put the strongest resistance debuffs into dwarf form to help its damage output). This would not only make the attacks hit harder, but would also help your allies hit harder as well (i.e. it would "give back" to the team). -
I have tried Dwarf with Swift and Hurdle and actually found the hurdle to be a bit TOO much when even single-slotted with a common IO. I'm sure I'll get used to it in time, but for right now I find myself overshooting my jumps a bit.
My honest first impression was... Dwarf with Ninja Run.
And now I want a ninja costume for my Dwarf. -
As someone who already 5-6 slotted all their human and form attacks with set IO's I'm looking primarily at Spiritual Radial (and ultimately Core Paragon once those options go live) since recharge and, to a lesser extent, healing are two of the only areas I don't have more or less soft-capped.
Damage-wise I'm already at the ED cap so until the rare and super-rare options come online they aren't worth looking at (since I'd only get about a 5% damage boost out of it). Endurance-wise all my attacks are sitting at 50% or so in EndRdx from set already and my Recovery is around 3.36/sec so improving my Endurance isn't going to do much (I already take on Sappers for FUN due to nearly soft-capped ranged and energy defenses). And Accuracy isn't going to do much since between set bonuses and IO's I'm already sitting at over +100% accuracy with all my attacks (even with accuracy floored I'm hitting 10.27% of the time) so more accuracy isn't going to meaningfully effect my numbers.
Which leaves Recharge. From testing it has closed the slight gap I had in my dwarf form's attack chain (strike, smite, strike, flare, strike, smite, strike, taunt w. damage proc... etc.) and increased my human form's dps by bringing my heavier hitting powers up more quickly. With the uncommon radial boost, I found that it greatly improved my survivability because it improved both the healing and recharge rate of all three of my partially slotted self-heals to the ED soft-cap (the human and dwarf form heals each heal half my hit points and recharge in 26 seconds).
I suspect that when the rare and ultra-rare options become available that I may swap out the Spiritual for Musculature... but until then Spiritual is definitely the way to go for my PB. -
Going off of my previous post, let me try and present a more cohesive "What I'd have done differently with hindsight mode active."
CoH was originally concieved with several faulty premises;
- Everyone would team nearly all the time.
- Street-sweeping would be a desired method of advancement.
- Missions needed to have time sink elements to keep the players from chewing through content too quickly.
- Players are bored by hard numbers.
From these poisoned roots and the desire to force players into this line of thinking, most of what was really wrong with the game sprung. These are things that I would have removed if I'd known then what I know today and were in charge with this knowledge.
- ATs should have been designed from the beginning to be soloable.
- The chief method of making them soloable would be a non-binary mez system (as previously outlined) that would keep squishies from being immediately locked down and make non-squishies still feel some of the effect of the mez.
- Futher soloable modifications would include all AT's having at least one ranged attack option and some type of defense (be it actual defenses or the ability to debuff foes).
- Remove all Hazard Zone or replace them with non-hazard zones.
- Remove/Combine many of the existing zones.
- Atlas/Galaxy/Perez as one zone with the Hollows arcs re-worked into Perez Park and a Hellions/Skulls gang war event added (along with the Kraken).
- Kings/Steel/Skyway combined with both fire, SuperTroll, and Clockwork events present.
- Talos/IP/Terra Volta combined with ghost ship and Lusca events intact and merge in streamlined versions of the Striga Isles arcs located now on the docks and islands of the large port zone.
- Bricks reworked as main 30-40 zone (with prison break event and elements of Crey's Folly) and Founders/Peregrine combined into the 40-50 zone and incorporate the Flashback system into PortalCorps (and the monster islands incorporating elements of Eden).
- Keep Faultline, Croatoa, and the RWZ as all have solid story-arcs and environs that don't fit well elsewhere (as opposed to Striga and the Hollows).
-Set the zones side by side running from the Atlas/Galaxy/Perez (downtown governmental and park) to KR/Sky/Steel (the urban blight around the cleaned up core) to IP/Talos/Striga (the docks) to Bricks (heavy industrial and the prison) to Founders/Peregrine (hi-tech and upscale) so that war walls are not needed.
- Contacts would give you their number immediately.
- Missions would be redesigned to be mostly in the same zone and needless fed-ex and hunt missions stripped from the arcs.
- Missions would take place mostly within the contact's zone and each zone would have a whole series of arcs akin to the zone arcs of the Hollows, Faultline, Striga, etc.
- Radio/Tip missions would exist from the start and a lot of the previous street-sweeping crime events and Safeguard side-missions would only spawn in relation to certain tip/radio missions.
I'd do a lot more than that... but that's a solid start. -
I'm going to bring up the thing that I think would have made the most difference...
Non-binary mez effects.
Immobilize effects would slow the target until its magntuide finally reached 100% and you could no longer move. Stun effects would increase recharge until its mag reached 100% and you could no longer use powers. Hold effects would do both.
Mez Protection would function like damage resistance... reducing the intensity of the effect while Mez Resistance would function as it does now.
For example, a stun attack might have a 33.33% magnitude for 10 seconds (increasing the victim's recharge times by a third for 10 seconds). A scrapper's mez protection power might provide 50% protection and resistance... dropping the effectiveness of that attack against them to a one-sixth increase in recharge time for 5 seconds.
Thus, mez effects debilitate and slow everyone to various degrees, but it would still take several effects to completely lock down a squishy, yet even the melee types would be slightly effected by the mezzing without being completely overwhelmed.
I think that such a change would have made a HUGE difference in the perception of the various AT's and kept Mez effects from being the "I win" buttons they're generally seen as. -
I've got my KM/WP up to 41 currently and I have to say that I've generally found it on par with my MA, Fire, and Electric builds (all using WP). As others have said, Power Siphon makes the damage quite nice (a fully buffed CS will drop most bosses' health bars by half for me), but the big thing for me with is the nicely stacking mitigation.
Specifically, all the powers inflict -damage and then either have a good chance at knockdown or stunning your target. Your tier 2 and 3 recycle fast enough you can even stun bosses on a regular basis (not all the time... they die too fast for that... but it happens often enough to be noticeable... especially if its a War Walker). The net effect is that with each hit you're reducing your target's damage, buffing your own damage, and either knocking the target down or building mag for stun (or both in CS' case). It also stacks well with Air Superiority's knockdown (flight is my preferred travel power).
My current build calls for dark mastery as my APP. It made all the difference with my Fire/WP build where the lack of primary set mitigation was making life difficult. Coupled with the -damage, knockdowns, and stuns of KM it should give me more than enough debuff and soft control to deal with nearly anything.
I will speak up for Repulsing Torrent though. Unlike a traditional build-up, Power Siphon takes time to reach peak effectiveness. Opening on a large spawn with RT can really break up its alpha and give you time to build up your +damage before they get organized. You don't need it fully-slotted by any means (an Acc IO in the base slot is enough for that purpose), but with the changes to Fitness coming it makes a good one-slot wonder for breaking up alpha-strikes. -
All, I'll say is that I won't object to some type of buff to the PB, but I don't need one to feel uber on mine. The ability to slog into a x8 spawn and beat it down by myself (it probably takes me a bit longer than a scrapper, but I can survive it easily) is more than enough to let me feel potent.
Personally, I think all the PB needs is a couple of tweeks;
1) Add a resistance debuff to their attacks (along with the existing defense debuff) to up their damage potential in a team-friendly way.
2) Reduce the change time for the form shifts to under a second (as natural shape shifters they shouldn't have to strain like they do before exploding into a form).
3) Improve the recharge time of the dwarf form strike and smite attacks so they can be reliably chained with just a bit of +recharge and make the taunt auto-hit in PVE.
4) Increase the mag on Pulsar to 3. -
Quote:The main reason I think it should be co-op zone is because Fire Base Zulu is being run by Vanguard (they just don't have the spiffy uniforms) in an effort to keep an interdimensional invader from conquering our world.I just gotta ask: why do people want the Shadow Shard as a co-op zone when there are unexplored regions of it that could be given exclusively to villains?
In other words, its the exact same scenario as the RWZ (which also has some other factions like Nemesis hiding out in it too).
That screams co-op zone to me.
The major revamp I'd do on the Shadow Shard is spread the levels out so that FBZ is a 20-30 level zone, Cascades are 30-40, Chantry is 40-50, and Storm Palace is a 50+Incarnates zone. Each zone would have a series of story arcs (9-15 missions per zone) and a revamped TF that moves the story of the Shadow Shard forward to a final Incarnate-level TF as you face off against Rularuu himself to keep him from escaping his prison and devouring the Earth. -
Quote:I don't know about you, but I'm thinking (at least in that toon's storyline) that it'll be MY Praetorian after I get all my Incarnate slots and then go back to kick his spandex covered hiney.I note that if Cole actually wants to kill everyone in Praetoria, if that is his sole and explicit aim, then he's got a really weird way of going about it. I mean, he can go switch off the sonic fence if he wants to, or just start beating people to death with his bare hands. He is the sole Incarnate of Praetoria; he can survive nuclear weapons and the Hamidon; who's going to stop him?
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Okay, my wild theory for i20 craziness?
- Revamping primal missions to take advantage of the new alignment system. Certain missions will give you the option of a Vigilante or Rogue path that will count as credit towards flipping your alignment (or even change it outright) based on your actions.
For example, A revamped Martial Brass arc might turn the choice to help Amanda Vines (currently only possible by deliberately failing the final mission) into a true moral choice with a seperate "defend the WSPDR building" mission that tilts you towards Rogue for your actions.
Another example might be that a Vigilante doing Madeline Casey's arc might conclude that the most effective way to deal with her being transformed into a soulless minion of the Carnies is to execute her before the process is complete.
- "Spy" missions. True Villains can now journey to Paragon and True Heroes to the Isles under controlled conditions. Then leverage disappearing contacts to put special hero-only contacts into the Rogue Isles and villain-only contacts into Paragon City.
- Targetable civilians in the Rogue Isles (especially during Mayhem missions). Saving Kittens from trees and helping old ladies cross the streets in Paragon.