Titan_III

I think tweeks to the existing powers are far more likely at this stage than completely changing what a power is.

Ex. Remember the hullaballu over changes to the epic power pools where they were going to drop some underused powers and replace them? Due to complaints from people who actually took those underused powers and liked them, all those pools now have five powers in them instead.

The bottom line is that no one complains if you're adding more utility onto a power (increased damage modifiers, cosmic balance usable in forms, dwarf usable while mezzed), but they'll scream bloody murder if you want to get rid of or change what it does.

So when looking at buffing the PB, suggestions that add without replacing what's already there is what's mostly likely to get implemented with minimal complaints from the base.

As mentioned, I don't think I've heard anyone here complain about the idea of -resist being added to the PB's attacks. Alternately a -tohit (your attacks have dazzled your foe making it harder for them to aim) would improve the survivability of a PB and their team (possibly more than an AoE heal would... you don't have to heal if your foes aren't hitting in the first place) without the need to take it's focus away from dealing damage or radically change how the PB's powers work.

Similarly, enabling some of the other PB powers such as build-up and conserve energy to be clickable while in the forms would add to their utility without taking anything away from what people who use them now have. No one who likes the powers as they are now would have any reason to complain. Minor buff on paper since click-buffs carry over to forms anyway, but a major QoL improvement to the players for whom dropping forms to buff was a major annoyance.

Similarly, I'd like to see group energy flight improved with some minor tweeks. First, change the -tohit to suppression like every other movement power. Second, an increase to the flight speed of those within the aura so that they are slightly fast than the person generating the aura. Third (and to my mind, the most important), a visible bubble showing the outer edge of the aura. This frees the person with the power from having to worry about outrunning the group and gives everyone a clear marker of where the flight field begins and ends (for both those who want it and those who'd rather stay out of it).

While I'm personally happy with my PB as is (that billion+ inf in IO sets colors my viewpower a lot though), I'd have no reason to object to any of the above suggestions (-resist or -tohit added to the attacks, click-buffs usable while in forms, and tweeks to group energy flight) and they'd probably do a lot to close the gap between PB's and WS's without having to completely re-invent the wheel.

That's exactly why. Base End cost is 0.26/sec and base +recovery for the dwarf form also works out to roughly 0.26/sec. Within limits it's worth it to slot some EndRdx into dwarf, but because of how the math works more than two SO's worth isn't going to be worth it at all.

Right now I'm running two Hami-O Resist/EndRdx, one 50 Resist IO, and one 50 End Mod IO (4 slots total).

The result is 58.8% resistance to all but psi and net +0.2 end/sec recovery (presuming no other +end effects are running). Coupled with all my other +Recovery set bonuses and full sets with EndRdx in my dwarf attacks I don't have any endurance issues with dwarf form and the resistance is capped.

Still a Tri-Form, but I spend a LOT more time in human form now, especially solo. On teams what form I take depends a LOT on team-makup.

Honestly? A better way to answer your question would be that, before i13, I was actually a dual-form nova/dwarf and i13 is what made me a true tri-former.

I'm trying a human-only PB now for concept reasons (it's actually a Kheldian-built power suit being worn by a human so while it can duplicate many of the powers, it can't duplicate the form shifting), but generally I find nova form extremely useful. If you go WS it's your ONLY means of using flight as a travel power and it's AoE damage is very useful on teams.

I also find it very useful for tanking. Seriously. My Tr-Form has a 40.5% ranged defense so I can survive a ranged alpha pretty easily. So I open on a large spawn with scatter and detonation to draw my initial aggro, then shift to dwarf form as they're closing to hold it (and as a bonus, +3 minions are generally already half-dead by the time they get into range of my flare).

Don't forget that human form ranged attacks had their ranges buffed up to the usual 80 foot range from the previous 50-60 ft ranges as well.

Also, even though it applies globally, the toggle suppression instead of toggle dropping feature for human form shields is another huge bonus for human-form Khelds.

[ QUOTE ]
Note that the defence increase being slight is because only defense bonuses from IO sets will be available and will require sacificing other potential bonuses.

[/ QUOTE ]
That depends on how you slot. Thanks to 5 full Thunderstrike and 4 full Mako's Bite, plus as many other +ranged defense sets as I could slot, my PB has a 40.5% ranged defense and a energy/negative energy defense in the mid-30's.

That defense really adds to your durability up when you can keep the mobs in melee range falling on their backside regularly... especially given the inordinant amounts of energy and negative energy attacks at higher levels (even the Rikti blades have an energy component to their damage so they tend to whiff on four out of five swings).

Another factor in survivability to remember about dwarf, especially if it's not your job to hold aggro is that dwarf step opens up opportunities to "take a breather" long enough to get back to human form and pop some utility powers before your foes get back into melee range with you.

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not sure how many people have been joining this game, but I can't see it being too high of numbers. CoX is a ghost town compared to what it used to be, so any penny counts.

[/ QUOTE ]
Numbers have seemed about the same to me. If there's a dip at all I'd blame the gorgeous weather we've been having lately before any of the changes that 99% of the player-base probably didn't even notice.

As to the price being too high, then stop paying by the month. If you pay by the year it's more like $11.99 a month. I drop more than that going to a movie and that only lasts about two hours.

[ QUOTE ]
Last night, entering an AE mission, I saw a tip. It said something along the lines of "Custom Critters take a lot of space in your Story Arcs, so try and use them sparingly".

I conclude therefore that giving ranged attacks to custom critters is all in-line with a policy the Devs have about custom critters being more for flavoring our stories rather than providing the bread and butter for them.

[/ QUOTE ]

That said, I was able to write a full story arc with a custom group that had more variety than most minor factions in the game (i.e. ones like the Red Caps or Knives of Artemis that have one minion, one LT, and one boss) and still stay well under the limit.

I've generally found that as long as you keep it to eight or fewer custom characters you shouldn't have too many problems with fitting your story in as well. At seven or fewer it's not even an issue even with the longest, most text-heavy arcs.

[ QUOTE ]
BTW, it's been asked but I don't know if it was answered...does this apply to Set IO's too or just Common IO?

[/ QUOTE ]
The diminshing returns of higher level IO's applies across the board, so I'd say yes.

Also, since set bonuses only apply when you're running at the IO's level minus three (so the recovery bonus slotting two level 50 Thunderstrikes goes away if you exemp down to level 46 or lower) you're better off slotting lower level set IO's so you can use those bonuses across a wider spread of levels if you exemp yourself much.

Further, from what I've been able to determine, the exemping process does not factor when you got your slots in a power into determining which set bonuses apply. It only looks at whether or not you have the power at that level and then applies all the set bonuses that power provides... IF the IO's slotted are no more than three levels above your current level.

Thus, I generally try to slot using level 30ish set IO's as much as possible since this allows me to keep as many of my set bonuses as possible all the way down to the late-20s.

To get an idea of what a difference this can make, my Peacebringer currently has 44% ranged defense bonus which aids my survivability immensely. However, because of how I originally had it slotted (the slots I gained at higher levels I slotted with higher level IO's) my bonus dropped to around 20% just exemping down to level 44 to the Quaterfield TF and to only 10% or so when trying to run Numina (level 40).

By comparison, with my new slotting, I hold onto all my set bonuses down to around level 39, and my ranged defense is still above 30% when I exemp down to level 28 for the Moonfire TF.

If you breakdown the TF's by level you've got only the ITF, LGTF, STF, Mender Silos, and three of the Shadow Shard TF's (7 total) available without exemping down below 50.

If you slot all 30 IO's for your sets you can also run, Moonfire, Citadel, Hess, Twilight's Son, Katie Hannon, Manticore, Mender Lazarus, Numina, and Quaterfield (9 additional - 16 total) with your set bonuses pretty much intact.

At least that's what I've found.

As a corallary to this guide, I think it's worth pointing out that, unless you're planning on retiring your toon as soon as you hit level 50... or can afford to purple out the build... you're better off slotting set IO's that are less than level 50 as well.

I only really started to discover this when I did start to play one of my level 50's regularly and went after the Task Force Commander accolade. I had a ton of powers slotted with level 45-50 sets and then I'd be auto-exemped and all those set bonuses I'd built my character around (I had near stamina level recovery bonuses, an acc bonus on par with double slotting any power with SO's, and a capped ranged defense buff... all of which were VERY forgiving of sloppy play) vanished in a puff of smoke.

Since then I've used multiple respecs to divest myself of my high-level set IO's to replace them with as many as possible in the 30-35 range. Having now done so, I'm able to keep the bulk of my set-bonuses even when exemped as low as level 27 and the increased survivability in those increasingly common situations (I run a lot more TF's and Oroboros missions with my main 50 now than I used to) more than offsets the loss of a few percentage points to the accuracy and damage of individual powers from not having level 50 set IO's slotted.

[ QUOTE ]
What about the Tsoo and their skirts, though? Between them, their bosses have almost all the Martial Arts attacks already, don't they?

[/ QUOTE ]
Yes, but they're also probably rigged differently than the standard Male, Female, and Huge models we have for toons. Likewise, they don't have variable length legs and variable waist and hip sizes, not to mention variable overall builds to deal with either.

As I understand it, that's how a lot of the NPC models get away with things that we, the players, can't.

Just a comment on the villains of the 35-50 arc. The Midnight Squad tangled with a certain sect based out of Rome whose history was traced back to the Roman Empire... The Path of the Dark (a.k.a. the Nictus). I'm hoping we face Dark Novas, Black Dwarves, War Wolves, and various beings with shadowy powers. My Khelds can't wait.

My random guess... we're going to get something involving time-travel. Either something really bad happens and someone (i.e. you and/or your team) has to go back in time to keep it from happening -or- someone goes back in time and flubs things so you have to go back and fix it.

My guess is the really bad thing in the present will be the infected. Further, because we're going back in time we'll get to face the 5th Column before they were absorbed into the Council.

Finally, the other side-effect of time travel could be the ability to do flashback missions as you jump back to earlier points in your own character's career.

At least that's my random two-cents.