Ultra_Violence

Sorry my favorite is still the city councilman who when you rescue him says:

"I hate getting kidnaped by supervillains" like it is part of his job description.

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I didn't want to go there.

The thing is, that seems to be what States' expects to be the role of the AT. If you are doing more, then the AT may need to be taken down some more.

How much is enough, and what should you expect. Apparently the contribution that Statesman's Tank made was sufficient to meet expectations.

If that is the case, then the question becomes, is it worth playing a character that contributes that much (little)?

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He "tanked" 1/3 of a spawn for 7. He took up a little more than twice his share. On a team with any sort of non-melee AT i'd expect any scrapper to at LEAST do this much. I think it's pretty clear that states' grand vision for tanks is nothing more than scrankers who draw a little more aggro than the vastly more offensively effective scrappers.

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Exactly how does a Scrapper with less defense than a tank do do at LEAST as much defensively? That makes no sense. Since other than Regen and Dark they are using the same numbers but lower than Tanks no Scrapper is going to be able to deal with damage better.

Statements like this are why nothing comes of these threads. There is no basis for them. They are little better than the obvious flames.

The Devs respond to facts not opinions.

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I'm not so much looking at what I could do in the past, as I have certain expectations of "Invulnerability." I can still get by with my stone (non-granite unless they change the crappy transformation to at least match the size of the character) and fire tankers even though I may not be etirely happy with them. Pre-I5 I wasn't entirely happy with Invulnerability (the glowieness and toggle-management annoyed me conceptually) but at least I felt more like an Invulnerable character and less like Just-slightly-tough Guy. Now, a fight with two yellow Tsoo bosses leaves me running for the hills in the red - with three resist Inspirations and one big Luck used and Dull Pain as well. Huzzah.

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This is actually the point of the change. A yellow boss is supposed to be tougher than a player. A player shouldn't be able to easily fight 2 at once period. The fact that anyone sees is it as an expectation shows that the game was broken.

The observation that the Devs regret creating Tanks is sort of a given. I believe they regret creating Tanks and Empaths as both made it hard to balance everything else. The recent changes were required to keep their builds from hitting numbers that unbalanced them compared to everyone else. Also the Devs did design the game with the idea that one person would become "invincible" draw all the aggro while another would build their character to do nothing but heal while the rest of the team did damage. They expected 8 balanced characters.

They are now trying to "force" that on players because otherwise they can't design new content and make it balanced both for teams with the Tank/Empath structure and any other structure. PvP just made the whole thing worse. A Tank/Empath team might well be unbeatable (straight up anyway) by a CoV team. Only hope for villains would be for a Stalker to take out the Empath just as his team strikes LOL. If it turned out to be true something like that could KILL PvP very fast.

A lot of money is invested in CoV and PvP. Accept it. Accept that the role of Tanks has changed and try to work with it. That doesn't mean that the last word has been spoken but it does mean that flaming States won't change anything. You'll just be ignored like all flamers are.

The Devs are in a hard spot they don't want to kill Tanks any more than the players do but they have to look at the money side of things too. If you can suggest how to make Tanks work better while maintaining the balance they are now trying to achieve, this is the time to speak up.

CoH has changed and you have to go slower and fight lower level groups of mobs. That doesn't mean the game doesn't work it just means you play the game differently.

Honestly I think the answer for melees is for ED is to change the Schedule B enhancements to Schedule A. The 20% Enhancements become 33% Enhancements with the accompanying increase in cap. This increase just about matches the loss experienced by instituting the cap. Actually you will have a little bit less defense but that is ofset by the fact that you will have more slots to put elsewere.

The point is that you won't have a lot less defense (either defense or resistance) as after I5 defense would seem pretty balanced (read that - it has been weakened enough).

The only other power that strikes me off the bat as possibly critically effected is END Drain. I always thought that Short Circut was a worthless power until I 6 slotted it and now I can't . Now they are saying that you won't be able to completely drain a Leut/Boss with one attack. That is a death sentance for a blaster who won't survive their counter attack. I liked to solo my Elec/Elec Blaster, I suppose I could try following up SC with Power Sink but I really don't see a boss (+minions) letting me live long enough to get both off.

Just because they share a PvP zone doesn't mean they can team, just that they can shoot at each other

You are lucky they add anything to the game at all. It isn't like adding to the game is normal behavior or anything.

For most MORPs the monthly subscription cost is for the servers so you can play, not for anything else. EQ released like 3 free zones over 5 years with a whole lot more people paying, while releasing 6 $50 expansions.

WoW has been out less than a year and is ready to release it's first expansion. WoW has released a few new areas but nothing close to the additional content/powers/costumes that CoH has. Heck WoW hasn't even fixed all it's release bugs yet.

Whine all you want, you are not going to get a much better deal from a much more professional company than you are getting here. This is a quality product at a good price. My only fear is of Cryptic announcing cut backs.

Both Haste and Stealth work well if you Solo.

When you find a Void/Quantum, switch to Human and hit Stealth and Haste. Then charge and hit with Radiant Strike.

By using Stealth you should have no trouble getting to him without triggering any other mobs and without having him see you. There is nothing worse than getting knocked down on your way to your Alpha Strike and then the Void pulls out the big gun and everything goes down hill from there...

Stealth also allows you to switch to human form and look around corners and check out groups of mobs before attacking them in Nova Form. Everyone as attacked a lone mob only to have a Void come from around a corner and blast them. Stealth can prevent suck surprises from ever happening again at the cost of slowing your game down slightly. It's not all that bad though there aren't too many situations where you can't see around corners but having stealth really helps in those situations and unlike Quantum Flight you can still attack at will.

Haste helps because:

1) If Void/Quantum is still up after 1 round Haste brings RS up very quickly usually fast enough that you don't need to run away while it refreshes which is a LOT safer.

2) Void/Quantums aren't usually alone. Once you take them down having all your attacks come back up right away again is much nicer than having to run or switch forms.

3) Haste + Nova Form is truely nasty. There is no longer any delays between your attacks something is always ready to fire. This is awesome for Boss fights where you can just pour on the damage. The only problem is that I love switching to human form and using RS/IS in fights but with haste this becomes less necessary unless you need other human powers (like a heal).

4) While less important all those other powers like heals, build ups etc all come up more often and faster. More is better.

The nice thing about Haste on a PB is that you don't HAVE to have perma Haste. Actually you can't truely have perma-haste since you won't be in human form all the time. Any level of Haste will help you a lot the more Haste you have the more situations you can use it in.

With the I5 changes to Holds your guide to Telekinesis becomes all the more important.

The only change is that now Mind Controlers are powerhouses solo if they slot their single attacks instead of their AoE holds. Because they have so many more attacks vs other Controllers, by skipping Haste (to get more slots) they can actually do quite well damage wise now. With the pet reduction they can actually compete quite well solo now and pre-32 are solidly better.

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No, it's a fix for those after the changes so that they can still spend in theory about the same about of time and effort to get this badge.

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No No. What I'm sayin is those of us that have had to take out 10K of monkeys getting something is fine, but now that's it's been reduced to 1K, 9K of our effort in time was wasted. It would be nice to recognize the time and effort spent b4 nerfs. Like with all the Hami-Os that were nerfed and all the hours people spent on getting them. The Hive is now a dead zone.

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The reason is that for 90% of the people getting 10K monkeys wasn't as hard as getting 1K is now because you could herd a huge number of them all at once. They just sat around waiting for a Tank to round up a massive pile of them, then they would clean them all out at once with a Nova or whatever.

Now you have to kill them 10 at a time so its a lot more work (well except for the Tank who sort of had to work hard before ). So for many it would like being giving a badge for being PLed.

If you got the badge the hard way you will have to find self validation in your accomplishment. Personally since I was unwilling to herd I just skipped the whole thing and did without.

I would also like to chime in that Stealth and Hover were the only defenses available for non-Melee ATs outside of the Fighting Pool. I would hate to see the Fighting pool become required if you want any defense in combat.

Now I do see the problem with having these powers stack with Tank/Scrapper powers. What I would perfer would be if the suppression only applied to Tanks/Scrappers if that is what is felt necessary for balance.

I don't see a Blaster/etc even with Stealth maxed out being overpowered defensively but even that could be tweaked. Now possibly Stealth + Hover + Weave is too much so make the various pools not stack if you must. That is power pool defenses don't stack you get the best defense, you can activate multiple, for their other effects (stealth, hover) but you only get defense from 1.

Just don't take all defense away from the non-melee characters. Power Pools are quickly becoming unattractive. I actually am building characters where I don't see the point in picking a 4th pool and sometimes even a 3rd pool anymore because after Stamina, Travel and Haste the desirablity of powers drops considerably in I5.

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I dont know if its me, but this seems like a weak attempt at damage control (oh, lets throw something out there to take their mind off I5)...

Or perhaps its the fact that Im just fuming that they keep nerfing every AT accross the board every time they do an issue. I mean come on...

Just my angry two cents

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They hardly nerf every AT with each issue.

Regen is not the only scrapper type.

And defenders, blasters, and controllers are rarely nerfed. Even wtih this issue, defenders were pretty much left alone, and blasters got a buff or two

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Last issue Tanks got a big offensive buff. Before that Defenders got an across the board offensive buff. There have been numerous smaller buffs. People just don't post all the time about the buffs.

Actually that isn't completely true. After the Tanks Secondaries were buffed in the last release there was an outpouring of complaints from Scrappers that Tanks were outdamaging them. This is actually the only reason I can think of why Scrappers got an across the board damage increase in this release. Sure their secondary was reduced but Tanks primary was reduced and they got nothing, so it can't be because of that.

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Get your question-asking caps on , for we look forward to seeing what inquiries you come up with based on the information that’s made available!

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ALL QUESTIONS HAVE TO BE WITH CAPS ON? SEEMS KIND OF RUDE.

My point of view is that current/past Fire Tanks are overpowered but that Fear is a poor solution for dealing with it.

I think the Fear aspect of Burn is still the problem given that Tanks don't have ranged attacks having the mobs run from them makes it hard for them to do their job in teams unless they leave their burn patch and what is the point of Burn if they just abandon it?

Refresh and damage is how Burn should be controlled rather than fear. Tanks need to control mobs, giving them a signature power that sends the mobs after the rest of the team is a mistake. Likewise giving them a power that does more AoE damage than anyone else's power is equally a mistake.

By making Burn's refresh so that it can't even come close to stacking you "effectively" reduce the damage because players must now either slot more refreshes (instead of damage) or use the power less. If you can't use the power constantly it becomes less of a solo tool and Fire Tanks lose their PL ability and need teammates again.

Burn should be a mini-nova for Tanks, less damage but usable more often. I don't think it was ever meant to be the same as Blazing Aura, up all the time.

Now if we accept that Burn can't be used constantly (which is reasonable since other Tanks solo with only their secondaries). Then you can look at increasing Fire Tanks tank skills to bring them more in line with other Tanks (at least give them some status protection somewhere).

Personally I would say the second biggest problem with Fire Tanks beyond Burn Damage is the rigid build problem, lowering damage and making them better tanks will help with that. There are ultimately very few choices if you want to build a "good" Fire Tank. There are lots of ways to build a bad one however. I think this hurts the game a lot more than people think.

Those who don't check the boards or know the numbers, may never figure out who to make a Toon who is workable a high levels because the system has gotten way to complicated to figure out any other way. Example: a Fire Tank in live without Tough/Weave (preferably fully slotted) will have a lot of trouble surviving at high levels even it they DO take and slot all their "good" AT defences (which not all do). But there is no way for anyone to guess this looking at the game, so there is no guarentee that even with a respec that they will figure out the "right" build.

Unfortunately the DEVs are using I5 to build the game around Power Players (I hate to admit that this is what I have become but after over a year of play you can't help but become this I guess) who know the perfect builds and this is just one example. I am concerned that new players may never be able to figure out how to make a workable character on their own again.

With changes to herding and AoEs PLEASE REDUCE MONKEY BADGE! It is just too painful to bare thinking about if you can only fight 10 at a time.

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As things stand right now, the usefulness of a controller is far to often redundant with a good tanker.

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EVERY AT is redundant. One of the major things that makes teaming bearable in CoH is that you don't have to sit around saying "Shoot, we can't really get this team moving without a Controller/Defender/Tanker/Whatever and there are none on." You can pretty much throw darts at the search screen and, assuming the players are reasonably competent, have a viable team. That's a good thing.

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But wopuldnt it be cool to have synergy? The tanker rounds up, the controller locks down (shutting off mob toggle powers). Both can do their job without the other, both benefit from the presence of the other. For the *majority* of mobs, it doesnt matter if they are held or not, so long as they are focused on the (near unkillable) tanker. When I was leveling up my tanker I was grateful for controllers to be around to *help* (read, I didnt *need* them) with mobs like avalanche shamans. As you rise in level, the value of those holds fade out, since mobs powers get more lame.
What I dont want is the thorns going from a faction with tricks up their sleeves to some bland weenies who just have blasts. It seems thats all people want to encounter... fodder that offers no challenge, and exists only to be rounded up and leisurely nuked. Level 50 skuls in different outfits.

Id rather them tweak the ETC's exp up so that people try and build tactically balanced teams than dumb them down and remove their powers altogether. Put a cap on how many quicksands they can drop, have the power go away when the mob dies, etc, but dont remove it entirely just because its difficult.

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Doesn't help you much if you are solo though. 2 Earth Thorns currently hit harder than a boss does solo. That makes no sense in a risk/reward sense and if you tried to make the experience balance out when you got it up to a group level you'd be giving away the farm in each encounter.

The fact is that it just doesn't work as it is currently done.

Huzzah! Further proof that legitimate issues do get addressed.

Shhh. Quiet. Galaxy city is where all the smart people hang out that is why there are so few of us. When starting a new toon low lag and trainer/store is closer to tram than Atlas with no climbing.

Now as to why everyone hangs at Atlas I assume that they are afraid to go out alone and Atlas Park pretty much assures that.

Fir Bolgs, Tuatha de Dannan, Croatoa sounds like it was populated by people who hate my spell checker, like I don't have enough trouble spelling. lol

I have a muse. I get sudden bursts of creativity and I am forced to write my ideas down or express them in some way, before I can forget about them. Otherwise they drive me nuts.

So I have tons of half finished crap in my computer since my main objective is to get it out of me. Benefiting others is of much lesser concern.

Hopefully it will be Hollows Huge not PI/Stringa Huge. Don't need another huge zone with nothing in it but tiny islands and lots and lots of water. Saw all the water I ever wanted to in IP and Talos.

Yeah I have seen the numbers on that too IBM. Some people have a bit of trouble with math though and will try to mislead you. Be sure you know ALL the math involved. It goes like this:

Acc SO gives 33% to ACC to 1 attack.

Nova form gives 20% to ACC to all 4 attacks.

To Hit Buff SO gives 33% of 20% or 6.6% to ACC to all 4 attacks so sort of 25.4% overall ACC improvement it just doesn't help any one power much.

So To Hit Buffs aren't as bad as all that and they do save you slots if you want to add a little to all your attacks accuracy but don't want to spend 4 whole slots on it. On the other hand if all you want to do is make sure your Detonation hits then slot it with an Accuracy.

As far as Nova has built in Accuracy anyone who thinks a built in 20% accuracy is all you will every need is sadly mistaken unless they plan on only fighting white minions. 20% bonuse will max you out against white minions but that is it. Anything higher and you will have less than a 95% accuracy.

To Hit buffs are actually nice for people who really hate to miss and already have 1 Acc buff in all their attacks and still complain about missing at Invincible.

Elite Bosses and AVs will appear no matter what the difficulty that said Elite Bosses are no where near as tough as AVs. For most ATs you can defeat an Elite Boss by going up one level. I have defeated Frostfire and Heracles this way as a Blaster, Peacebringer and Scrapper (bring lots lots of Luck inspirations). Now my Defender was just screwed, just couldn't generate the offensive numbers fast enough.

Having to go up one level (or find help) to do a mission I can live with especially when you get a nice reward for the mission. Once you get into 40s though you can just give it up. Your choices are do Shard missions, Hunt PI or team for AV missions since all missions (or like every other mission is) are AV missions and therefore not soloable. I got to 50 mainly doing Shard missions but unless you have fly even that isn't really an option.

So if you plan on getting your loner Super Hero to 50 make sure to get him in a large Super Group now or plan on spending 2 months camping the parking lot at Portal Corp because there really is very limited places to solo hunt at 45+ too.

Best bet is to make sure you always keep at least one mission you like alive (don't complete it) so you can farm it when you want to. Of course each time to level you have to find a new mission

I can think of one way to make Blaster Melee attacks work. Greatly reduced aggro (compared to other ATs). That way on teams, a Blaster could actually use them without becoming the "belle of the ball". This would also give Blasters something to do while waiting for teammates to gain or regain aggro without undermining their teammates efforts.

The real trick with this pool is to take Assault and put a END reduction in it then 6 slot Tactics with at least 1 END reduction in that too. That way the 2 toggles cost very little in the way of END. Start fights off with both on as END get low turn off Assault.

My Ice/FF Controller was absolutely awesome like this. Running at invincible rarely missed purples. And it is important not to miss those purples with your holds lol.

What I would like to know is has anyone researched Khedians? Are they considered "everyone else"?

Here is how I bind my PB anyway. The way I handle it is:

Tray 1 is Human attack powers all temp attack powers,
Tray 2 is Nova attacks,
Tray 3 is Dwarf attacks,
Tray 4 is Human Defenses, Human Clicky powers, Temporary Defensive powers,
Tray 5 is garbage powers that I don't want to completely remove and stuff that got squeezed off trays 1 and 4 temporarily by too many temporary powers.

I leave tray 4 up at all times on the top line and the bottom tray changes based on my form. This allows me to see at all times if my Human Form "defensive" powers are up yet. Powers like Haste, Rest, Essence Boost and Build Up so I don't have to switch to Human form to see if they are ready to use and because I often want to switch to human use them then switch back and this allows me to have cursor "hovering" over power without keeping track of where power will be when trays change.

I use the Keypad to switch between forms. Keypad 1 switches to human, 2 to Nova, 3 to dwarf:

Switching to Human Form:
/bind numpad1 "powexec_toggle_off bright nova$$powexec_toggle_off white dwarf$$goto_tray 1"

Switching to Nova Form:
/bind numpad2 "powexec_toggle_on bright nova$$goto_tray 2"

Switching to Dwarf Form:
/bind numpad3 "powexec_toggle_on white dwarf$$goto_tray 3"

I sure hope I typed all that right.

I am not the bind king I just use simple ones. If you want real fancy stuff you need somebody else, but this will get the job done.