Trickshooter

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During the event, my experiences with Trick Arrow (on almost all the masterminds in RV) were that Glue Arrow was just too good. Having a set duration and not a set area of effect to leave it was a bit crazy, especially since it -always hit.-

Just my two cents, but I think it should be changed from autohit really. The rest of the powers were fine, I suppose lowering the animation times on them would be fine.

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Just an FYI, but Glue Arrow does have a set area-of-effect on the ground. Escaping it won't release you from the Slow effect (that lingers), but it will allow you to jump and fly again.

If Stalkers can say the best defense against them is to never stop moving, then I'd say the best defense against Glue Arrow is to stay off the ground.

Because of PvP, don't expect to see a -Regen in a quick-recharging (for TA anyway, 45 seconds base), auto-hit power like Poison Gas Arrow. The possibility of keeping someone from regaining HP (outside of Heals) for an infinite amount of time sounds rather nasty.

Now... in a quick-recharging, tohit-checking, small radius power like Acid Arrow where it's only possible to cause -Regen if the power hits, and most likely only ever on a single person (besides MMs and Empaths who turn Heal Aura on autofire and then hit Follow, who really stands within 8 feet of allies at all times? ...Man, those Empaths would be the perfect targets...)? That's much more likely. I don't see it being more powerful than that similar Traps move, since you have to stop attacking to use Acid Arrow, while Traps version is like having an ally that fires 10 (I think) Acid Arrows for you.

P.S. Please ignore this post if:

A) There's already an auto-hit -Regen.

AND if:

B) Traps' Acid Arrow-wannabe power isn't actually as similar as it sounds.

>_>

PvE testing shows Acid Arrow still at 20%. Maybe it's some messed up PvP thing?

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Still waiting for more people. Trickshooter is with me, Kenja and ScrewySquirrel are on.

We're starting in Steel to compare notes and figure out how to do a reasonable test with the heroes (due to level variations and inability of some to access some zones), then moving into Siren's to meet up with the villainous TAs.

Get in it.

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Bah, game seems to have crashed entering Warburg, now I gotta "Verify Image." :B I think that's it for me for the evening, Luminara.

No, the prepatch is just that huge patch with most of the stuff that is definitely going in the game. Just like on Test now, we had the big one and then a few tiny ones. They're just sparing people the looong download time the day I7 DOES go live. I7 isn't going Live after only like.. what? Two weeks. People can dream, but it won't happen.

Anyway, I can say without a doubt that the Glue Arrow changes now make it possibly the most annoying power in PvP for enemies. Can you believe I almost defeated a Stalker and Brute at the sametime using Glue Arrow and Oil Slick Arrow? The Stalker eventually reached the edge of the patch and hopped away, but the Brute... can't SMASH what you can't catch, I guess. Did I defeat either though? Nope, got defeated by one of them annoying Ice/Rad corrupters. Serves me right for being a solo Defender, I guess, but I was sooo close.

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How does everyone feel about getting together Wednesday night for some testing? Say, between 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. EST? That should give any west-coasters time to get home, and still be early enough for those of us on the east coast. Yesno? Noyes? Fishinpinktutus?

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Fishinpinktutus!

Sure, Trickshooter can be there.

P.S. Oil Slick Arrow is still not lighting everytime with this latest patch, though I'm not sure if it's supposed to, the patch notes seem to suggest simply a higher chance of it.

Don't mean to post right after myself but...

Studying the -Fly of Glue Arrow, it seems to only cause -Fly while enemies are in the patch on the ground, not for as long as they have the sticky graphic on them. I guess that makes it like standard slow patches, but with a lingering, inescapable -speed.

You can count Trickshooter in, if anyone is on when I am.

I believe the justification behind Glue Arrow not having -Fly is that it's debuff is inescapable. Tar Patch, Quicksand, and Caltrops can all be run from, Glue Arrow can't AND can now be perma (I'm not sure if that's true without Hasten). I think the Devs feel it might be too powerful if the only way to get out of it was to teleport.

Of course, I could be totally wrong. By the way, I think in PvP Glue Arrow has -Jump. I've seen it not have any in PvE, but Villains (and people on the boards) have told me they can't jump while under the effects of Glue Arrow.

I meant to post this, but I guess I forgot (I blame Cinco de Mayo).

Two Disruption Arrows from the same TA will indeed stack. If you can get out two and Acid Arrow, you can cause -60% Resistance for about two or three seconds (which is only enough time to probably get off one Blazing Arrow and either a Snap Shot or Aimed Shot, sadly).

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You dismissed my comment that EMP had -regen?

/e hangs head

Why? Have I not provided pretty reasonable and correct evaluations in the past?

E tu Brute?
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Theatrics aside, you can see the -regen on live if you want. It has always had it.

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Um.. no, me es... Defender? I don't speak Spanish. :B

Anyhow, he's right. EMP Arrow has always had -Regen on Live. It's just not listed in any of the description (they also don't mention it drains endurance either, but it does). The sad thing is that other Defenders get a much faster recycling -Regen. Both Kinetics and Dark's heals cause -Regen (I think), and Rad has TWO -Regens. Why must our only -Regen (The ultimate debuff against AVs) be in such a situational power? I agree with people who say to put a -Regen in Poison Gas Arrow or Acid Arrow.

P.S. Yes, I did actually get the "E tu Brute?" comment, before anyone thinks I'm uncivilized.

P.P.S. Git 'er done! *buuurp*

Lemme clear somethings up for the Devs who might be getting confused by the Glue Arrow fx thingy. I don't want this to become another Poison Gas Arrow where the players and Devs confuse each other.

When you use Glue Arrow, it last for 30 seconds on the ground and on any enemies in the patch. If an enemy leaves the Glue Arrow patch and reenters OR if an enemy enters it for the first time while it's already on the ground, they suffer from the debuff for 30 seconds after they stepped on or back on the patch, not just till the patch fades. This is what Castle says is intended.

Castle, what the players are saying is that sometimes, most common when the Trick Arrower is defeated while Glue Arrow is active, Glue Arrow's sticky fx (glue dripping off enemies feet) sticks around forever. This can sometimes happen with ANY patch power, in any set, but it tends to happen more with Glue Arrow.

Sorry, I wanted everyone to be on the same page. I can't sit back and watch Glue Arrow become the next Poison Gas Arrow.

Anyhow, as much as I think Disruption Arrow needs a secondary effect, PLEASE don't make it a Disorient! No more controls! It'll just end up having to be weakened for Controllers with Trick Arrow! Make it cause Knockdown, make it cause detoggling, make it interrupt powers with interrupt timers, anything but more control that is stronger for Controllers "by design!"

Just in case no on noticed, there are new sound effects for Acid Arrow and Rain of Arrows.

It's not much, but I thought it was worth mentioning.

How they got to the top of the priority list, I don't know.

I was under the impression that NPCs don't use toggles, and that all their powers are "clicks." Which is why using a Hold or Disorient on a flying enemy doesn't cause them to fall from the sky. Did that change?

Also (I think something like this was mentioned, you guys are getting so off-topic, it seems) Glue Arrow's graphic has not been disappearing after the effect ends. They start moving at normal speed, but the spewing, gurgling glue is still on their feet, even when they die, but it's clear that the -Speed is not affecting them (It's especially clear on deceased enemies ).

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Radiation Emission can debuff defense. Trick Arrow can't.

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Acid Arrow debuffs defense.

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Radiation Emission can debuff regeneration. Trick Arrow can't.

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EMP Arrow debuffs regeneration.

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Radiation Emission has a Slow and Recharge debuff that's up 1/3rd of the time base. Trick Arrow's? 1/4th.

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Trick Arrows has 3 -Speeds and 2 -Recharges. If we're just focusing on those effects, there seem to be enough to go around that if one is down, I can use another.

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Resistance debuffs? Trick Arrow falls behind whenever Hasten's down.

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This I don't get. With 3 Recharge SO's, Disruption Arrow is ready every 60 seconds or so. It lasts 30 seconds (I think). So for 30 seconds I can't have enemies being affected by it. Just 30 seconds. Burritos take longer to make in the microwave. I realize in the game that 30 seconds can seem like forever, but don't make it seem like a Trick Arrows defender can only use Flash Arrow regularly. I use all my debuffs regularly except EMP Arrow and Oil Slick Arrow. Certainly the recharges are long, and make you worry that you're wasting them if you use them too late in a fight, and being forced to slot each with 3 Recharge SO's is terrible... I forgot where I was going with this. Anyway, the point is that I'm not spending forever waiting for powers to recharge. There is downtime, and it can seem like forever when the recharge timers are balanced against 6 Recharge SOs and permaHasten still, but it's not so bad that I'm waiting 5 minutes between groups of enemies, forcing my team to slow down.

If my team wants to go ahead, they can go ahead. I can be assured knowing that Flash Arrow, Acid Arrow, Ice Arrow, Poison Gas Arrow, and (if I had it) Entangling Arrow will be up every fight. That's not that bad. Not every Defender goes through their entire Primary at the start of every fight, do they?

The real problem is that Trick Arrows' debuffs are the least effective debuffs. Not just because of their base values, but also because many only have a single slottable-effect, which you have to slot for later because you need the first three slots for Recharge enhancements. The recharge times aren't that bad with 3 Recharge SOs, but the fact that you NEED 3 Recharge SOs makes the set feel lousy to people who use it.

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That's right. I went there.

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Repent your wicked-ways! The Power of CoX compels you!

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Oh dear, my mind is in the gutter... *covers his eyes to not see that Avatar anymore*

So I had this idea for how to improve Trick Arrows. I'm not sure if someone might have suggested this before as this thread got way too long.

Anyway, so they recently changed some toggles to time-limit toggles, and I think something like that could seriously improve Trick Arrows. Instead of firing out an arrow and then having to wait a really long time to prevent stacking, how about making them time-limit toggles?

It would go something like this. My team and I are in a mission and there's a group up ahead. I fire off glue arrow and my team tears through the enemies before the 30 second timer runs out. My team wants to move on to the next group already. I click glue arrow again, shotting off the toggle (almost like dismissing my pet), wait a few seconds (a FEW seconds) and then fire Glue Arrow at the next group.

Oh no! My team's not done with this group, but I know the 30 seconds are coming to an end. I can either A) Wait for the timer to end and fire again, or B) end the toggle now and then fire again. Either way prevents stacking from the same Trick Archers user.

How exactly one would explain an arrow being a toggle, I dunno, but this is a fantasy world so we can stretch, I think. Something like this could really improve the Trick Arrows set. It stops stacking of really useful powers, but also allows them to be used when they're needed, not just when they're available.

The powers that could work this way would be Glue Arrow, Poison Gas Arrow, Disruption Arrow, and maybe Oil Slick Arrow (if stacking was a problem with that).

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Ok, given the latest change to this power, this proposed additional change really sortof seems over the top to me. Before todays patch, and the "fix" to the acid arrow damage, the arrow could serve as a moderate AoE damage and -res/-def. As of today, not only has the rate of damage been massively decreased, but so has the damage itself. And thats on top of the -res decrease? I can see that acid arrow was pretty powerful before (I really used it a lot anyway), but now its barely worth taking when you consider how short the debuff lasts, and how little damage it does, and how small the affected area is (does not seem to be nearly as large as any of the other area affect arrows). Can we at least get an explanation of why acid arrow is getting gutted in damage? Was it really THAT powerful??

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I agree. Acid Arrow was great and useful before, but now it's not worth taking. I fired it on minions 10 levels lower than me and was incredibly discouraged to see a power that could once take out a whole mob of minions that level now barely scratches their health points with the incredibly slow rolling -1 damage. This is Acid Arrow, not Hot Water Arrow. Acid hurts painfully all at once until your nerves are dead, it doesn't annoyingly sting your skin. It's acid, not a sunburn.

Maybe it's -res was too good for Disruption arrow being the next available power, but I didn't see anything wrong with the damage. It didn't do alot to begin with (except on really low-level minions) and now it barely does anything at all.

I can live with the rest of the soon-to-be changes on this powerset, I was expecially glad Ice Arrow was being pushed up and switched with Flash Arrow. A single-target hold is nice, but as a Defender I was looking forward to being able to have all AoE attacks. But I really don't like Acid Arrow now, and probably won't take it. Or I will, and will just respec it away once I have the more useful AoE's in TA.

Flash arrow doesn't aggro, because it's other effect is to lower visibility so you can sneak around enemies. If it aggro'd them, there'd be no point to the -Visibility part.

Love this set so much. I've been dying for the bow & arrow powers, but couple of issues:

- I agree with some people that Entangling arrow seems completely inferior to Ice Arrow, and I think the only ones who will ever have entangling arrows are controllers because they're forced to take it.

- Flash arrow misses too often to not accept accuracy enhancements, and the animation seems both too subtle (I didn't even know it was working at first) and disappears too quickly.

- Disruption arrow, based on the description (I haven't gotten it yet), seems weaker than Acid arrow. Both -Res to everything, but acid arrow can damage. If any power could go and be replaced by a heal early on (not that I even want a heal in this set, cause I don't), it could be this power.

- And if adding a heal is what some people want, I could easily see one done like transfusion from kinetics. You hit your enemy and somehow transfer his health/endurance to your allies' health. But if the animation for either suggested heal (the other being to shoot in the general direction of your ally with a medicinal arrow) is too long, than.. well, it would suck because your ally would probably be eating the floor before your arrow fired.