Umbral

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Judging from your rant, I guess you don't like concept toons. People taking a power for (shock) because they just want it.

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Actually, I've got no problem with concept toons as long as they're actually effective. If your concept is "useless Tanker" or some variant thereof (because you're not taking any of your shields and want to live without mez protection), that's you're choice, but I'm not obligated to have you on my team.

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You don't have a right to control others. It seems that the only common problem with all those bad players is that you "assumed" something.

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I may not have the right, as you put it, to control the people on my team, but I do have the right to kick you off of my team because you're less effective than you should be. You're there because I invited you. If you don't like it, don't join my team or go and form your own. If you want to purposefully nerf yourself or play in a manner less than competent, do it on someone else's time. You've got no more right to be on my team than I do of forcing you to act in a certain way though. Interesting, I can enforce my decision moreso than you can.

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But hey people telling other people how to play their toon is one of my pet peeves. I just assume people aren't [censored].

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So it's bad to assume that people are actually competent but it's good to assume that they're whatever got edited out (it could be a number of things but I'm going to assume that it's something concerning rudeness)? I'm willing to give people a certain amount of leeway, especially if they're demonstrably new, but I'm not going to let someone who isn't pulling their own weight because of concept decisions (petless Mastermind, all passive tank) stay on the team and get experience they're not even earning. I'm well within my right as a team leader (and most people would actually agree that I'm even compelled to do so because I'm a team leader) to get you off my team for not doing enough.

Self-nerfed characters rank down there with afk leechers imo, if only being slightly better because they're actually trying.

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And again, even if we boldly assume 1 defender is the lowest damage choice of 7 possible heroside ATs, it still doesn't mean that 2 defenders are the lowest damage duo of 49 possible combinations. That'd be 2 tankers or 2 peacebringers. Oy, I'm getting a headache just thinking about how slow those duos would be!

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Once again, it depends on the primary of choice for the Tanker (though I agree for the PB in general). Fire/* and Dark/* can both do some amazing damage thanks to their auras, especially when paired with a decent secondary.

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Anyway, the specific defender duo I recommended (Dark/Psi + Dark/Sonic) is especially gifted in the damage department, as it packs a frightening (no pun intended) amount of resistance debuffs, plenty of AoE damage, and a great mix of damage types.

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This pretty much follows with my advice: get 1 support character (Defender/Controller) and 1 of any AT (including Def/Troller). You're set.

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I saw a post over in the Brute forums about an attack chain leading off with Blinding Fient. Lemme see if I can find it.

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BF>AttackVitals is probably the attack string in question. It doesn't really do much with Empower though, but that's partially because Empower isn't a particularly incredible combo.

Right here.

The basic buff is 10% +tohit and 37.5% +dam. The combo portion is 3.3% +tohit and 12.5% +dam. The combo benefits are all listed under the combo ending power with the post script of "If Dual Blades ***** Mode **" on the effect entry.

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Also, AT damage modifiers are only a small part of an AT's real damage output. Also relevant are the number of attack powers, damage scales of the attacks, number of AoE attacks, target caps on those AoE attacks, area coverage of those AoE attacks, and the influence of buffs and debuffs being traded between the characters. Excellence in all of those categories is why defender teams outperform what a simplistic glance at their AT damage modifier would suggest.

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By that same logic Controllers should be on both lists as well, as I pointed out. In general, Defenders are actually lower damage than any other AT, even when they've got that additional buffs and debuffs to toss about because they've got less to work with from the baseline.

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So maybe your not listening in the fact that your talking about pleasing everyone I'm talking bout pleasing a decent minority.

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Your right let the Devs spend all the time and money for the next year to get Vehicles that don't do much so a Decent minority will like it. Put off GR so we can make a decent minority happy while making a good Large group very mad. Ya that sounds like good business to me

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I'm curious as to why he thinks that he's pleasing a decent minority, much less one of any size.

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She is a girl but she is MINE don't get any ideas about stealing her from me....

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Eye ccc. The Ol Duke-A-Roo... I must prepare!!

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please. let me watch? please? lol

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Says Rose as she hangs off my arm. Everyone knows Umbral is the sexy sexy. The girls just love my long, luscious locks of brune beauty.

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3. Engine problems: I need to know what the particular problems are instead of just hearing there is one. There doesn't need to be more then one person in a particular form of transportation.

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There is the inability of the engine to force movement based turning (re: having to move forward or backward to turn), the inability of the engine to differentiate between terrain, the inability of the engine to orient a character for a non-flat plane (you have to be standing straight up, which doesn't look right whenever you're using a vehicle on an incline because the vehicle would clip into the terrain), the inability of the engine to disallow strafing, etc.

If you want to figure out what the engine can't do that would need to be changed, think about everything that you can do as a person that a vehicle couldn't do or wouldn't look right doing if the vehicle was centered exactly where you were standing and both of you had to be standing straight up. Those are just some of the limitations that the devs would have to overcome. It's a process of introducing a huge number of variables and processes to deal with all of these new calculations as well as requiring a rewrite of the world code itself to put in all of the relevant information so that the variables and processes can actually have something to operate with.

Now, think about everything I just told you about, and consider the current state of the game without vehicles. What would adding vehicles contribute? Not much. You'd be able to move around the same as always, only now you can't attack whiel doing so and have a different visual effect. Would enough people be willing to pay enough extra to make the enormous work load profitable, especially when you consider how many players are in game now and don't really care about vehicles? Keep in mind that, considering the workload, all that would come with the extra cost is vehicles. There would be no extra content, no extra costumes. It would only be the vehicles.

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Damage Output ATs: Scrapper, Blaster, Defender
Damage Control ATs: Tanker, Controller, Defender

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Tankers have greater damage output than Defenders do, as do Controllers. Defenders are not damage output ATs, as is evidenced by their beautifully low .65 damage scalar for their primary attack mode (ranged) with no inherent mechanism to increase it. Tankers have a .80 damage scalar for theirs (melee). Controllers have a .55 damage scalar, but they've got containment which, depending on how often you think containment is attained, allows controllers to attain between a .825 (50% containment) and 1.1 (100% containment) scalar.

Honestly, I'd suggest getting a single "hard" AT (Tanker, Scrapper) and a single "soft" AT (Blaster, Controller, Defender). Of course, the functionality and placement of the specific AT on the hard/soft continuum depends heavily on the power sets that the build in question takes, as well as the power sets the AT it is paired with takes.

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Also I have enough space slots to fully slot apocalypse into a power. This question is for Knight Chill (or any other decent ice/ice/ice blaser) - do you think it'd be better placed in Chillblain or Bitter Ice Blast? I was thinking of Chillblain as it would improve my overall DPS...though I'm still unsure if this is even correct.

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Unless you've got a very strange attack string that uses Chillblain more than BIB, you'd be better off putting the better set in BIB, because it's got better base numbers to operate off of. If you're talking about slotting Chillblain from the base slot, then you should slot the purp set into BIB and the set in BIB into Chillblain. It's pretty apparent that BIB is the better attack considering they've got the same activation in Arcanatime (re: their real activation time) and BIB does significantly more damage.

As for numbers, check it:
Chillblain: 47.42 DPA (62.6 damage, 1.32 sec activation Arcanatime)
BIB: 107.73 DPA (142.2 damage, 1.32 sec activation Arcanatime)

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PWN!

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Hold on, hold on, hold on.

We're talking about Japanese shows dubbed into English, right? Shouldn't it be more like:

<mouth moving>

</mouth moving> PWN!

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Actually Aett, that would only be the live action. Anime seems to get right more often than not.

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Except with fewer frames per second so you have to use choppier movements and occasionally contort your face to account for chibification.

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Good to know. Thanks M_I_A.

And I still consider Inf to be money, because you lose it when we make purchases. Personally, if I had a high influence with people due to saving them, my getting something from a store would not decrease that influence.

"Ohh... Hero X bought apples from the grocery store. I sorta dont respect that so much..."

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The problem is that you're not buying apples from a grocery store. You're getting local magicians to contact otherworldy entities for you, getting training from super spies, getting companies to provide you with highly expensive technology, etc. You're never actually "buying" anything. You're using your surfeit of good deeds to get people to give you stuff. You lose this a portion of this surfeit when you get the stuff for free because people are only so willing to give away stuff for free.

Infamy is the opposite. You're using intimidation and your reputation for villainy to get free stuff. Whereas you'd probably be able to get as much as you want from the average person, the people that villains obtain their enhancements from are used to dealing with dangerous individuals or are dangerous individuals themselves and are giving out their enhancements out of respect/fear. Eventually, you'll even get to the point where, even if you scare them, you won't scare them enough to have them give away what they've got for free.

As for inf transferability, it's the same as telling someone to mention your name. You're giving them the right to call in some of the favors that you've earned or some of the authority/fear of your name. Of course, this analogy isn't perfect, but that's because inf was designed as an abstract currency that then became a more realistic currency. In normal gameplay however, inf should still be considered as it was originally imagined.

Check out this Paragonwiki page for all the explanation you should need.

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accolades

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Gah. I always forget no click accolades. The passives are acceptable, if only because you can't turn them off.

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ok guys i will bite what is a RWZ Challenge i tried searching for it but my search foo is weak i could use a little help in what it is. i am always looking for a challenge on my Fenders

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The RWZ Challenge is a Scrapper challenge that has gotten used by every AT out there because everyone wants to see how they stack against a Scrapper.

The challenge itself follows the no insps/no temps/no deaths rule (which you have to enforce yourself) with a couple additions. No outside help (otherwise it wouldn't be much of a challenge) is allowed, nor is dropping aggro at any time (re: every enemy in the group has to be attacking you at all times).

As to what the Challenge actually is... head to the RWZ, find a group with 3 level 54 bosses in it. Kill them all without dieing. That's it.

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Now not having a parser I may just be missing it but do these enhancements actually work in Death Shroud?

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Procs in toggles and passive powers only check once every 10 seconds for all affected targets. Essentially, you'll be doing significantly less damage than you thought you should be.

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This is not ment to start heated discussions. It is only to see if enough people agree with me and show the Devs that Atlas Park is being harmed by the existence of the AE building. Thank you.

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Forum Rule #5.3: "Do not create threads/posts to “petition” or “Lobby” for game features, additions, changes, or other issues. You may post suggestions and/or ideas to the boards, but you may not create a ‘petition’ for others to sign."

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Yes, i see that my idea has only 4 actual attacks, a mez and a oh-sh~ button (thats what i call nukes). Hmm, Its strange because I'm using Ice Blast as a model because it some how pulls off the triple attack and no snipe idea thus is is close to what I'm thinking of when it comes to DP.

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The problem is that you're only barely following the Ice Blast model. Ice Blast has 3 single target attacks, 2 control attacks (one of which does very respectable damage), 1 rain, 1 AoE, Aim, and the Nuke. It's really using 4 st attacks, not 3. It's giving up the snipe for a controlling attack (Bitter Ice Blast). Your model was actually closer to Electrical Blast's: 4 real attacks, 1 control, 1 utility, 1 snipe (switch for toggle), Aim, and the nuke.

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Also, While the toggle is on I believe a penalty would be needed, such as -20% damage or even more so that players have to make a choice on either full assault or a more technical approach.

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First off, 20% -dam isn't all that much considering that attacks are generally slotted for 95% +dam already. That's less a 20% reduction in damage and more an 11% reduction. You'd be better off just going full tilt for crazy (if the idea ever flew) and just reducing the base damage of all of the new powers.

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This would allow even a blaster to become more supportive on a team. Corruptor's would really enjoy it stacking with their own secondary. And defenders (power proliferation!) will like the idea of not having a crummy secondary. I wont go any further on this subject. I'll let others brainstorm on it. Personally, I like it much better than the original idea.

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First off: it's a blast set, it should blast. Allowing someone to work around that and let it be a complete support set shouldn't really fly. Sonic Blast already blows every other defender blast set out of the water because of this. Besides, the defenders that don't like their secondaries feel so because of the low damage mod, not because they can't support enough. If anything, their secondaries create a glut of support capability because all of their attacks pack a more significant debuff than actual damage making their secondaries already more significant for their support than for their damage. You'd just be exacerbating it. The Cold and Sonic Blasts already give up more than Dual Pistols in order to have their support capability and theirs is actually focused (-spd and holds v. -res).

Still, the biggest problem is that, even if you somehow managed to address all of the problems that I've mentioned, you're making a really complicated set. Dual Blades is already pretty complicated but this is a complete magnitude above, especially considering the slotting and balancing issues.

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There is a potential problem with the whole dual nature, come to think of it: enhancements.

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This.

Remember that most people don't actually pay attention to the numbers of what a power does. They just take it for granted from the description. I've seen Katana/* and BS/* Scrappers that slotted for def debuff rather than accuracy because they thought it would help them out more. Telling players that they can slot def debuff into a power (re: the second) is what they'll pay attention to, not how much of an affect it has that it's only up when they turn their mega-modifier toggle on.

Something else to consider: while I think it's possible with some very heavy handed power screwery to have powers toggle between 2 values traits such as range and area of effect, it's not going to work out like you think. The power would need to be defaulted (as the game sees it) to a zero radius AoE within a preexisting larger AoE (which is how gauntlet works). The functionally single target AoE would deal damage all the time and the larger AoE would deal damage only when the mode is activated. However, it would never check tohit for the other damage so that's pretty much out of the realm of possibility. Another possible option would be for the toggle mode to activate a summoned pseudo-pet that does the second attack, but, either way, you're getting needlessly complicated.

You've got similar problems with most of the other powers you mention. You can increase mag on a target reasonably easily, but increasing the duration is a bit tougher. You'd need to either completely negate the previous effect and have a different effect with the longer duration override it or have a second effect with a similar mag but longer duration added to it, which doubles the duration for the standard period and keeps up the remaining mag for the extended.

It's also needless to say that you'd also be making a needlessly complicated power set. People wouldn't want to play both. They'd only want to play one or the other and, what's even worse, Castle would need to do balancing work for both of the sets, which makes it all the less likely. It's an interesting, but simply not viable, idea.

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1. weak attack/fast recharge
2. moderate attack/ moderate recharge
3. moderate cone/ moderately long recharge
4. Aim
5. Toggle for whatever-we-decide
6. Low Damage/ Special Effect (most likely a mez)
7. High Damage/Long Recharge (ussually with short range)
8. Toggle for whatever-we-decide 2
9. Superior Cone Dot (Generic Full Auto..)

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The problem I see with this one (and it's a pretty big one imo) is that the set only has 4 real attacks. Tier 1 ST, Tier 2 ST, Tier 3 ST, and the cone. The control can't (and shouldn't) be considered an attack on its own. The tier 9 can't (and shouldn't) because, even if it recharges rather quickly for a nuke, it's still not going to be up more than once per fight most likely. Making an attack string based around 4 attacks is going to be particularly strenuous. Just look at Electrical Blast: you've pretty much got to dip into your secondary to make it worth playing because it shorts itself an attack for Voltaic Sentinel.

A better set up would be 3 single target attacks, 2 AoEs, 1 special, 1 control, Aim, and the tier 9. Don't bother trying to overload it with the special functionality of the power set. Just try to make it playable.
1. tier 1 st
2. tier 2 st
3. weak cone
4. tier 3 st
5. Aim
6. stun
7. +dam/+special toggle
8. strong cone
9. tier 9

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Along similar line of "solving" this issue, it's probably been covered but how was the Scrappers chance to Crit taken into account? As it's higher for Bosses than it is for minions.

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I believe that Billz calculated crit chances as an additional quantity of damage per power, using an a slightly upwardly skewed average when multiple crit rates are given for the power (5% and 10% crit rate averaged to 8%).

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So, on that note isn't the easy fix to just make it slightly higher still?

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The only difficulty is in increasing the crit rate for each power entry individually (as I believe the devs have to do) and determining how to resolve the differences with the powers with higher crit rates (re: would they need to be increased to be larger by percentage or simply by the static crit rate increase).

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5. making sense. my whole plan is about vehicles working and making sense.

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The problem is that you're not addressing the problems that are posed within the context of the engine. It's impossible to prevent strafing or to force slow turning in the engine. The only thing that terrain is capable of doing is changing which animation is used. Loads of coding would have to be done to fix these problems. It's a complete change to the engine. Simply stating "it can't strafe" or "you can't use it anywhere but roads" doesn't solve the problem. You have to actually address the problem beyond saying "turn it off". It's a much more systemic problem than you have ever given it credit for.

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I know that softcap defense is around 45% but I want to ask how good it is without any form of healing or damage resistance except inspiration. It would be a blaster fighting level 52 LTs.

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Soft capping def is what allows my DM/SR scrapper to be a one man AV killer. Certain combo's are just NASTY GOOD!

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Keep in mind that, if you're using the Smite>MG>Smite>Siphon, you're getting an extra 21 hp/sec unenhanced simply by using Siphon Life.

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Thanks. I'll try it out.

When I meant defensive, I meant for parties. I feels like there aren't enough slots on the shields.

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You do realize that 3 is gonna get you to ED, right? The shields are just fine.

Here ya go.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.401
http://www.cohplanner.com/

[u]Click this DataLink to open the build![u]

Level 50 Magic Defender
Primary Power Set: Force Field
Secondary Power Set: Energy Blast
Power Pool: Fitness
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Leadership
Power Pool: Speed
Ancillary Pool: Dark Mastery

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Deflection Shield -- DefBuff(A), DefBuff(3), DefBuff(3)
Level 1: Power Bolt -- Acc(A), Dmg(5), Dmg(5), Dmg(7), RechRdx(7), RechRdx(9)
Level 2: Power Blast -- Acc(A), Dmg(9), Dmg(11), Dmg(11), RechRdx(13), RechRdx(13)
Level 4: Energy Torrent -- Acc(A), Dmg(15), Dmg(15), Dmg(17), RechRdx(17), RechRdx(19)
Level 6: Insulation Shield -- DefBuff(A), DefBuff(19), DefBuff(21)
Level 8: Hurdle -- Jump(A)
Level 10: Combat Jumping -- DefBuff(A)
Level 12: Dispersion Bubble -- DefBuff(A), DefBuff(21), DefBuff(23), EndRdx(23), EndRdx(25)
Level 14: Super Jump -- Jump(A)
Level 16: Power Burst -- Acc(A), Dmg(25), Dmg(27), Dmg(27), RechRdx(29), RechRdx(29)
Level 18: Health -- Heal(A)
Level 20: Stamina -- EndMod(A), EndMod(31), EndMod(31)
Level 22: Aim -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(31), RechRdx(33)
Level 24: Maneuvers -- DefBuff(A), DefBuff(33), DefBuff(33), EndRdx(34), EndRdx(34)
Level 26: Repulsion Bomb -- Acc(A), Dmg(34), Dmg(36), Dmg(36), RechRdx(36), RechRdx(37)
Level 28: Tactics -- EndRdx(A), EndRdx(37), ToHit(37), ToHit(39), ToHit(39)
Level 30: Hasten -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(39), RechRdx(40)
Level 32: Assault -- EndRdx(A), EndRdx(40)
Level 35: Explosive Blast -- Acc(A), Empty(40), Empty(42), Empty(42), RechRdx(42), RechRdx(43)
Level 38: Nova -- Dmg(A), Dmg(43), Dmg(43), RechRdx(45), RechRdx(45), RechRdx(45)
Level 41: Dark Consumption -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(46), RechRdx(46), Acc(46)
Level 44: Dark Embrace -- EndRdx(A), EndRdx(48), ResDam(48), ResDam(48), ResDam(50)
Level 47: Soul Drain -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(50), RechRdx(50)
Level 49: Vengeance -- DefBuff(A)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Vigilance

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K, had to ask because this has been bugging me for awhile.

45% defense is the soft-cap for *even con minions*, correct? So anything else (ex: lts, bosses, AVs, GMs, including +1 minions) would require additional defense to reach the cap?

So wouldn't having a bit more be a good thing, as very few people fight only even cons on teams?

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No, 45% +def is all that you'll need against anything within 6 levels of you because of how the attack mechanics work. You take the base chance to hit, which is determined by (50%-targetDefense+ownTohit). At the softcap, this number is 5%. The number is then modified by the total accuracy modifier of the target, which is what higher level enemies have. Against anything less than 6 levels above you that's not packing +tohit (re: Rikti Drones, vengeanced buffed Nemesis, AE mobs with BU up), defense above 45% will do nothing for them.

Check out this link for more information. Or you could simply trust us when we tell you that 45% is all you need, even when you're running Invincible missions, because we know more about the game than you do.