Venture

Here's what gets my goat:

I wanted the Stone Cold badge for my Mastermind. I got to Port Oakes, did my schemes and heist, took Vendetti as my contact. He gave me two missions (capture the sick Archon, steal the Council's account numbers), then gave me the Vampyr arc and then shut up because I was level 11. No badge.

I'm not angry that I couldn't get every single badge and arc in the Port Oakes bracket. I understand that the game needs replayability. I'm angry because I couldn't even get the one badge I wanted due to level constraints.

I was not PLed in any way. I only did my own missions, no grouping. I played in what I consider to be a competent manner; I was aggressive in street hunting to and from missions and I turned the difficulty up a notch as soon as I thought I could handle it (level 6). I feel like I was punished for showing a modicum of skill. The strategies people have discussed in this thread to prevent outlevelling content are, to me, absurd -- not kill the mobs in my own missions?!?

On my Brute, I took Billy Heck. Was 8 or 9 when I got to him; when I hit 10 I got the Last Man Standing arc, dinged 11 when I checked in after the last mission. Heck shut up and didn't pass me off. Didn't get the Fire Imp mission. Again, just levelled right past it without even trying.

That sounds like a bug. The fix is not live, yet, to my knowledge. I am not positive it has made it past the design stage, since it requires code and each and every mission that uses that code to be altered.

This issue has made it into CoH, for what it's worth -- yesterday one of my Kheldians was immediately ambushed on entering a Clockwork map.

Yes, I /bugged it.

This makes zero sense -- why do we become resistant to damage as we get hurt? -- and I can't see the numbers possibly even beginning to make up for what we're going to lose to ED.

Haven't seen a Troll Rave yet, but have worked on the fires a few times. I agree that the extinguisher power is too slow and inaccurate. Also, the penalty for not saving the building is extreme -- the event is all risk, no reward. Badges don't count.

Also, it seems the firefighting badges are given for defeating the Hellions, not working on the fire, which just makes it less likely the building will be saved.

I understand that the Defense on Stealth has to be cut in order to match the changes made to SR and Ice Armor.

The suppression, though, is out of line. The ability to cut agro with Stealth made up for a lot of tactics the game can't adequately model that would accomplish the same end. Whether or not all the Defense suppresses, if the power suppresses in combat it's functionally useless. It's not worth spending a power choice to avoid agro while travellling...easier to just kill what gets in your way usually.

Pacifist Oranbega is pacifist because there is no one left to fight, they killed everyone else. They destroyed every other culture on their world, then in horror over what they'd done, swore never to commit another violent act again, not even in self-defense.

I don't remember now if it was stated that they never made the demonic pact the "real" Oranbegans made, but if they did make it, they certainly fulfilled it.

"The Scroll of Tielekku" says that Tielekku taught magic to gods and mortals alike, which means it's at odds with the PT article.

KHAAAAAAAAAAAN!!!!!

...sorry, Test was down....

...there we go.

Eva Knight, Training Room

I staunchly disagree with this mentality. Defenders aren't needed, that's the way it should be. No team should HAVE to get a defender to be successful, defenders should just make the battles safer and/or faster, which they do.

I think any team of five or six people should be expected to require a Defender or Controller, and any team of seven or eight, or any team fighting an AV, should require both.

The "numbers" issue. I know there is a post around here somewhere where a dev says something about not providing #'s because we don't want it to be "City of Math" - I have seen some of the calculations required to get numbers and I have to say that my head a-sploded. Plus there is the maintenance of such a list - and well, you have seen how often the manual gets updated. (note on that - it is coming this month with I4 included) So I would also state that there are some resource constraints in that area. I doubt this will change.

This has probably been said often in this thread by now, but the real issue here is that people can't tell if their enhancers are doing any good.

There has to be a middle ground between zero information and Death By Math. If the confirmation box for slotting an enhancer said, for each quality affected by the enhancer (taking into account HOs and the like) "You will go from X% of maximum to Y% of maximum", it would be better than nothing.

Now that the trainers are getting expanded menus (on Test), it might be nice if a "what about this contact?" entry was one of the new choices....

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Won't the change from 2 minute disciplines to 30 second break frees pretty much end high level soloing for any hero without a power that protects from mezzes?

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No.

For starters, they're 60 seconds, not 30.

Wings ARE going to happen. We'll be seeing a Winged Epic Archetype named the Avilians sometime in the future.

Eh, from what I've seen that's very speculative.

Also, winged AT != wings as costume option, any more than shapeshifting Kheldians meant a Shapeshiting power pool....

Sigh, still no trenchcoats for my DM/Regen gumshoe Phil Noir...I may give him the leather-jacket outfit for his as-yet-unused third slot for a more casual street look. (His first costume gets him mistaken for Family. :-)

And it would be nice if we could get jetpacks some day. I dimly remember Statesman saying somewhere that wings weren't going to happen for technical reasons, but I'd think jetpacks would be a good bit easier.

Still, new costume options are always appreciated.

Actually the protector of Crete was Talus, not Talos. And he wasn't a minotaur...he was a bronze giant.

Talos was the nephew of Daedalus, who showed even more talent for invention than his uncle. Before he was ten he'd invented the saw, the compass and one or two others I don't recall. Daedalus killed him out of jealousy. In some versions of the myth he ended up at the Minoan court because he was fleeing punishment for this crime; in others he doesn't kill Talos until after Icarus is dead.

Scylla and Charybdis were monsters, not crashing rocks -- the crashing rocks are from the Argosy, Scylla and Charybdis from the Odyssey. Scylla was a woman with the heads of six dogs attached to her waist; Charybdis was a creature that constantly sucked in the ocean, creating a huge whirlpool. Not even Odysseus could safely pilot a ship through the two; he chose to veer too close to Scylla, sacrificing some of his men, rather than lose the entire ship.

The Argonauts, AFAIK, never encountered Circe. She's from the Odyssey as well.

"Serpent's Teeth" are found in a few places in Greek myth, if you take "serpent" as "dragon" -- including the Argosy. Sowing them like seeds causes them to produce warriors.

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Funny, how people say they need AoEs the way they are to avoid Sappers and mezz effects, when in the same post as he mentioned AoE changes, States' said minion mezzers are being dramatically reduced and Sappers are going down to 1 per group instead of 2.

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Both of which are mistakes, IMO.

A. - I think you need to watch some of the Vids of people soloing ARCHVILLIANS, which are MUCH more dangerous than a LITTLE +2 boss.

I am aware that people have found ways to solo AVs. That's a separate issue to me; it means that AVs aren't nearly powerful enough for their stated purpose, but they're special cases anyway. How powerful the players are with regard to the everyday environment is a separate (and to me, more pressing) concern.

B. - Obviously you haven't seen anyone with Perma-Elude, because the can get easily to 125% DEF or MORE.

I have Elude, though not yet at the permanent level. (I don't use Hasten. I will eventually six-slot it with Recharges so I can use it "permanently" if necessary, but don't plan to do so -- I will still have properly slotted toggles and passives.) It is not all that. It gives a base +60% to all three Reflexes catagories (melee, ranged, AE). That is barely more than one Phenomenal Luck. Speed junkies can slot two Defense enhancers and still run it permanently at +84% or so, but this is overkill in most circumstances because of the accuracy floor.

Reflexes does not ever, ever put you in the position of not being able to lose a fight to a mob worth experience. There is always a minimum 5% chance of being hit. It may require probability to stand on its head, but anything that can hurt you can potentially kill you. That's why I say it's where Scrapper defenses need to be -- good enough to be reliable, but not so overpowering as to be invincible. It's always possible to lose, even if you play perfectly.

I have to respectfully disagree. As you increase in lvl, you can take on higher cons. I am a Fire tank - the weakest def out of all the tanks. But as a 39, I routinely took on 41-43 Fake Nems. And usually had a few friends, too.

What do you think I was doing in Peregrine Island? I was 39 myself at the time (41 now), taking on 41-42 mobs (43s were doable but not worth the risk, IMO). I, too, could take on a 41 Chief Soldier at 39, but if he hit me twice, I would lose. That meant I had to use at least a Respite after every hit, and I couldn't floor them without Elude or Luck (melee Defense 56%, plus 20% if Divine Avalanche was up; +2 boss has a 90% BTH), making them at least a moderate-risk fight.

Why, why, why do you have to look into Regeneration?

I have a 28 DM/Regen myself and I think it needs looking into.

At the higher levels, I saw a (IIRC) 39 BS/Regen taking on a 41 Chief Boss in PI a few days ago (I may have the numbers wrong but it was at least a +2 spread). The Rikti could not win the fight. In the time it took its attack to recycle, all the damage had been healed back. Even if it hit with every shot, it could not win. That's not right. A +2 Boss should be something that puts any soloer, of any AT, any build, to pause at least. It should never be a slam dunk. Nothing justifies that.

And yes, I realise Invulnerability can probably do the same thing. That isn't right either. Reflexes is about where Scrapper defenses ought to be.

Am i the only one who seems to see that at least 2/3 of all the new content introduced into the game has been aimed at high level players?

Yes, probably because it's not true.

I've levelled up a number of alts since Issue #2 and things are better than ever for lowbies.

Does it seem odd to anyone else that the trial necessary to fix a GIMPED character is the hardest [censored] mission in the game?

I've had my share of bad experiences here. My 25 DM/Regen got debt-capped after a respec attempt with a bunch of buffoons that couldn't even get to the reactor, much less try to save it.

On his successful one, there was a period of a few seconds on the last wave when he was the last one standing in the core. I was certain we'd had it, but miraculously the downed people hit Awakens and got back into the fight in time.

Frankly, the reactor portion is probably the easiest part, since the level of spawns was cut down. The earlier parts of the Trial still spawn at +2 or so from your highest level character and can be very formidable, especially if you don't have a tight level range. I'd agree that they could use some looking at -- though if the success rate is 75% there's really not much to complain about -- but the reactor portion of the Trial is just right, I'd say.

Why are they doing so much damage so quickly?

Because there are so many of them at once, usually.

Why do I keep getting knocked down?

It looks like Disorients on at least some of the Troll Super Strength attacks got changed to Knockdowns. They were probably changed from Jab to Punch. Knockdowns are marginally less annoying than Disorients because they will not drop your toggles, and majorly more annoying because Disciplines offer no protection against Knockdowns.

Just what is the difference between a Troll Gunner and a Troll Bruiser now, anyway?

The Gunner can lower your Defense before he starts pounding on you....

Why doesn't the Outcast Torch have a melee punching attack like his compatriots?

He does, Scorch, level 1 Fiery Melee power. That's the move where he reaches out for you with both hands. Torch AI seems to prefer ranged attacks, though; they're the last to close for melee.

Granted getting around in Steel and Skyway is now more treacherous. Still, those with a modicum of skill should have no problem avoiding unwanted street enconters.

It's late, don't have time to parse everything, but I wanted to hit this point.

I just finished taking a Claws/Dark Armor character through Wincott's missions, starting at level 5, ending at level 6 (yes, she had to level to deal with a +1 Electric Eel). During this I noticed I'd made a mistake with her costume. So, after polishing off Bedrock and then going back out into the Hollows for a Jewel of Hera door (that spawned in the east corner....), I ran her through Steel Canyon so I could fix it at Icon. I got sniped at twice for small amounts of damage, but made it to Icon and back with no defeats.

Also, this was on Virtue, and again, the Hollows was full of people, groups running around, defeating mobs, enjoying themselves. Where is this unconquerable land of doom everyone keeps whining about?

If you're a solo player, you should be able to avoid the spawns, if you're careful.

I have only two outstanding complaints about the Hollows, and one is that mobs are spawning literally on top of players. (The other is that the Contact who sends you there in the first place doesn't warn you that it's a Hazard Zone and you will probably need to bring friends. I could have sworn that was in the text when Issue #2 was still being tested.)

I just copied the 5 Broadsword/Invul Scrapper I used to shoot this demo and tried Wincott's door missions. I was disappointed, they're way too easy now. Electric Eel and Bedrock were easier to kill than Bone Daddies or Damned. Confessedly she did hit level 6 before reaching either, but Eel was spawned at +1 so he was still an orange con.

Given that people are reporting some success at soloing the zone, I really can't agree with the reductions in power for the Outcasts and Trolls. A Hazard Zone that can be soloed by a level 5 character isn't very...hazardous. When I shot Scylia's demo on Infinity the zone was full of people running around in groups, fighting mobs and having a good time. I don't think the zone or the mobs need to be nerfed at all.

While I appreciate you taking the considerable time to share those thoughts & replies with us, they are mostly moot. The devs are tuning the Outcasts, removing the +1 bug and making things easier again.

In the immortal words of Yogi Berra, it ain't over 'till it's over. The changes in question are only being tested now. Game balance in MMOs is always up for grabs in any case. This entire discussion is about live content being adjusted for difficulty.

You need to understand that you are in a minority.

That's not entirely clear, and it wouldn't be relevant even if it was. An argument is correct or incorrect on its merits, not according to how many people accept or reject it.

While I sympathize with your plight, you'll still be capable of finding your challenge in yellows/oranges and when the slider comes, in missions.

That is the game's death warrant in one sentence.

My character IS super. I love that!

That's what blue cons are for.

This holds no water. You're basically saying I cannot solo mobs because I chose the WRONG POWERS? That's complete and utter BS!

Yes, you can't solo mobs because you took the wrong powers, and no, it's not BS. The fact that you have some flexibility in character design does not mean every single power is discretionary or that the devs are somehow obligated to make the game easy enough for any build at all to solo.

If my characters are now all of a sudden gimped because I skipped one power because I though the next one would come in handy, then there's more wrong with this game than a simple bug.

There is nothing wrong with it at all. You should have realised given that status protection was available at level 8 that you would need to take it by then. Heffernan's First Law of Game Design: if you give the players an ability, you must predicate game balance on the assumption that they will use it. Corollary: if the developers give you an ability, you must predicate your strategy on the assumption that it will be necessary.

So, again, it all comes down to the power-gamers and their über-builds.

I knew this was going to be your response, because I knew that properly-built characters wouldn't be having the kinds of trouble you were describing. But it is not about "power gamers and uber builds". It is about not goofing off when building your character. What made you think your character would be functional without state defense?

BTW, I have no problems fighting 0 or +1 mobs with that scrapper. I DO have a problem, however, with groups of 15 whites, yellows and oranges ALL jumping at me at the same time. Can you seriously sit there and say that you SEE NO PROBLEM IN THAT?

No, I don't see a problem with you losing when you're outnumbered and outgunned.

And on the Tanker: he has EVERY available Damage Resistance power except against Psionic, and therefore, Outcast should NOT be a problem for him.

That does not follow for a variety of reasons, chief among them the slotting requirements of the various resistance powers.

Point is: I can make a video showing how Eel hands me my butt on a silver platter, after having used EVERY available strategy to me, and you people would STILL say that I need to use strategy.

From the preceeding, it seems you lost that fight before it began thanks to poor choices in character construction. Perhaps you'd share the entire build with us.

It just goes in both directions. Making and showing off a video does NOT prove one damn thing.

Then, you are saying that I have not proven that I can solo groups of mobs in the Hollows, which is to say, I am lying. That's not very nice. I think what it really shows is that you are just unwilling to accept that your faults lie not in your stars, but in yourself. It's not that the Hollows is too difficult. You just don't have the skills to cope with it.

Catch-up time!

This is just silliness. It's a fact of life, and part of human nature that people in general, are more prone to quit something that is too hard than too easy.

No, it is a fact of life that some people are more likely to give up trying to do something because it is too hard than if it were too easy. For some people the reverse is true. It is not at all clear which is the majority, particularly among gamers.

You're avoiding the point of his statement. If his wife got to that point the 2nd or 3rd play session the result could be the same.

It could be the same on the 20th or 30th play session too, but it probably wouldn't.

The point here is that if someone is taking the game at their own pace, leisurely proceding through the early levels, they are less likely to feel broadsided when they run into more powerful adversaries.

Here is some worldy advice that help you greatly. Everyone does not equal you. Meaning not everyone can excerise the same focus that you can.

That's their misfortune.

Show a little more understanding.

I understand them just fine. That doesn't mean they're not bad gamers.

Actually EQ did succeed because of it's mass appeal. More housewives and non gamers played it than ever before (at that time, before the Sims & Roller Coaster).

Nevertheless, the game offered nothing but PvE monster-bashing, and did so with a fairly steep learning curve.

Plus, EQ is very easy the first 10 levels.

It is not, even with recent changes to make the newbie stages easier. EQ teaches you in very short order that past the very early levels (under 5) mobs of even level are to be fought by groups, not individuals. It teaches you quickly that mobs of higher level can defeat you before you can even respond to the threat, and that some zones feature mobs of vastly higher level than the intended level range of PCs hunting in that zone. It teaches you that most goals worth achieving are going to require the aid of other players.

They can do this now and they dont need Controllers, Defenders or any suppoters if they dont want them. Just solo missions and hunt in non Hazard zones.

Of course, missions are likely to spawn in Hazard Zones, not to mention defeat-X tasks set in them, and street grinding is pretty slow until you get to Bricks or so.

You have to understand whites = optimal for the majority. NOT optimal for you.

I am very sorry, but if we are all playing the same game we all have to face the same difficulty. If three whites = one hero, then we can't have people taking on three yellows or three reds instead.

Look back at the most successful games of the past. ALL of them prove you wrong.

I would say that none of them prove me wrong, particularly EQ.

What the hell is that? Are you a mind reader? You might be skilled in the game but you're certainly not in reading comprehension. Go back and read my posts, I state that I want more challenge in the later levels numerous times.

No, I'm a skilled debater who recognizes a pro forma concession when he sees one. Your willingness to concede that there should be challenge at "higher levels" has no bearing on this discussion, doubly so when taking into account that we have no idea what you consider to be a valid level of challenge or at what level you will graciously permit this challenge to take place.

Irrelavent. We're talking about novice level mobs being too powerful, not about archvillain fights requiring support.

Actually, we are talking about the Hollows, which is a Hazard Zone, and thus expected to be more dangerous than City Zones.

You were pretty quick to toss off that straw-man link. The trouble here is that if a straw-man argument was presented, it was yours:

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What if the mob difficulty was closer to FFXI, or EQ, where you'd need a perfect or near-perfect party in order to safely take down an enemy? How is that any more interesting?


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Now, I can't speak about FFXI, never having played it, but I pointed out that in the general case EQ did not require a perfect or near-perfect party for anything except major raids. Your argument attempts to portray that level of difficulty as the norm in EQ and what is being argued in favor of for CoH -- which is not true, and is in fact a caricature of the opposing argument.

But not if the base scaling, at the minimum (one-person/solo) level, is too high.

There is no indication of this being the case for Scrappers. Other ATs may have missions they can't solo in the general case (leaving out simultaneous objective missions and missions requiring AV defeats), but they have no expectation of being able to solo everything thrown at them. They may well have to outlevel a mission or ask for help. My 20 Illusion/Rad guy had to ask a guildmate for help today with both the cape mission -- too many mobs in the capsule room -- and a Sky Raiders mission -- Jump Bots aren't impressed with Psi damage. My Scrappers have taken out everything thrown at them, including pairs of +1 Bosses.

There's a fine line between 'desired' and 'essential', and many people want to push it over into the latter.

The problem is that there is no line between 'desired' and 'unnecessary'.

Yeah, (Batman) snipes and hides around corners all the time.

Sure. Batman, at least in the modern era (70s to current), doesn't just wade into 20 guys and start swinging. He picks off stragglers first. He knocks out the lights, or uses smoke. He tricks the enemy into dividing their forces. Batman fights smart because he knows the lion can lose to a pack of jackals.

There's more to defense than just status protection, and there should be. Damage plays a signifigant part, and (for the most part) blasters have little to no ways to mitigate that as well.

As I said, Blasters can stack pool defenses and get almost as much melee and ranged Defense as a Super Reflexes Scrapper. They can also add Tough for smash/lethal resists. Blasters can actually get their hands on rather too much in the way of defenses for my tastes. The only thing they really can't protect themselves from are status changes, particularly Disorients.

And as mentioned, it's not blasters who have difficulty with chain stuns and sleeps; what about fire tankers, or ice tankers?

Firey Aura uses active defenses (Healing Flames, Burn) against status changes. Ice Armor's Wet Ice gives Defense against all forms of damage except Psi in addition to status defense, though I imagine it gives a lot less than Frozen or Glacial Armor.

Or Dark Armor scrappers, who have to choose between being held or being near-one-shotted?

Dark Armor pays for the versatility of its set with having three holes in its defenses and only one cork.

Of course, any of these can also stack pool defenses, notably Tough and Weave, to mitigate the effects of exclusive shields.

Or Empathy or Kinetic defenders, who have no self-usable status resistance powers?

A Defender's status protection is his teammates.

What build, what powers, what slots? What levels are the mobs being fought? Just because one or more carefully-specialized and planned builds can do it doesn't mean it's somehow universally easy; it just means they're throwing off the curve.

It doesn't matter. If any character can solo the zone then it can't be too difficult for groups, and the zone is intended for groups.

Pretty good for hazard-farming, certainly, but that doesn't mean it's easy; it just means you're prepared ahead of time for it.

"It is by scoring many points that one wins the war beforehand in the temple rehearsal of the battle; it is by scoring few points that one loses the war beforehand in the temple rehearsal of the battle. The side that scores many points will win; the side that scores few points will not win, let alone the side that scores no points at all. When I examine it in this way, the outcome of the war becomes apparent." -- Sun-Tzu

What level mobs? 5, 6? That's a limited region of the zone, to say the least.

Level 5, even cons.

And I can't see that sort of performance against 7 or 8's, simply due to the way to-hit rolls scale, and the difficulty of boosting both defense and accuracy at newbie levels.

True. But I did not have to fight level 7 or 8 mobs. I just had to clear my defeat-10 tasks. I found the proper targets, engaged them, defeated them and moved on.

Did you recover enough inspirations between the battles to make up for what was spent, in the right distribution so that you could beat the next?

No, but I did not need to. There was a Contact right there to sell me more, and I more than earned the influence to buy them. Again, I only had to achieve my objective. I am not arguing that a level 5 character can street grind in the Hollows, only that he can defeat mobs on his own to satisfy mission requirements.

That's part of the crux of the argument with Hollows missions, especially; you can win just about any near-level fight if you blow enough of the right inspirations, but that doesn't mean it's sustainable, or worth the effort to.

It's worth it if it completes your mission. In doors, you'd only have to spend inspirations like that to take out the boss, most likely.

And what if you were a single target build? Most tankers, defenders, controllers?

Tankers, Defenders and Controllers are group-oriented ATs that must expect they will need assistance to achieve their objectives.

A single target build will have a harder time soloing in the Hollows but it can be done. I did it with a Force Field/Radiation Defender -- soloed all of Wincott's missions at level 5, ended at level 6 -- and that was on Test before the devs started nerfing the mobs.

Or if you didn't have invulnerability defense powers? Or...?

Perhaps you were not paying attention, but at that level an Invulnerability Scrapper has neither mitigation nor avoidance against elemental or energy damage. A good half of what those guys threw at me was stuff I just had to suck up. Solution: identify elemental and energy attackers, focus on them first. I took less damage when I did this with a Reflexes Scrapper. A Dark Armor Scrapper could, if he chose to, have both the smash/lethal and element/energy shields and use whichever one best suited the particular foes he was dealing with. Of the Scrapper sets, only Regeneration would be problematic as it has no real defenses until level 28.

On the Tanker side, Fiery Aura would make out the best, I think, with Fire Shield giving Smash/Lethal, Fire and (some) Cold resistance. Invulnerability would have the same problem for them as for Scrappers (Resist Elements is level 6 for them). Ice and Stone are pretty much about Smash/Lethal at that level too, though I think Ice's Chilling Embrace might give it a good edge.

Well no crap, it's a new zone, and one that just about anyone can access. Of course it'll be crowded early on... especially since it isn't obvious that you can skip the Hollows missions, if you don't know about it ahead of time. Or maybe all those people lurking around the mission doors begging for groups was my imagination?

There were no people lurking around begging for groups when I shot Scylia's demos. Everywhere I went there were groups of players, taking on crowds of mobs and beating them, and generally looking like they were having a good time. There was a really spectacular scene at one point with three or four groups of players each fighting one or more groups of mobs on the street in front of the police encampment -- I hadn't seen a battlefield like that since Planetside.

Listening to people on this forum, you'd think the Hollows was some kind of monstrous deathtrap, a one-way street of pain spiraling ever-downward to the debt cap, a place best avoided by all. In reality, players were in there pounding pavement and the bad guys. No one was whining in the global channels about the zone being too hard, enemies being unstoppable, etc. It looked like routine play.

The first is that the prior enemy groups were underpowered... but this doesn't seem to be the case, considering the constant downward tweaks of the Outcasts and Trolls, and Statesman's comments about them.

The earlier enemies are underpowered, and the devs are making a mistake by catering to the whiners on this issue. Given what I saw in the zone I find it hard to believe that datamining supports further weakening of the Outcats and Trolls. (Except for Hurricane, of course, but then every melee AT in the game wants that just gone.)

Does this mean that every one and every build can? No.

Of course not -- but that was never the point.

I said "99% of the player base can't do this".

My dear, ONE HUNDRED PERCENT of the player base is not SUPPOSED to be able to do this.

The Hollows is a Hazard Zone. It is NOT solo material. It is expected that players will fight here in groups. Any claims as to the zone's difficulty must be taken in that light, and in that light if it is possible for some builds to solo here, it can't be argued that the zone is too difficult. Are you prepared to argue that while a level 5 Broadsword/Invul (and a level 5 Kat/SR, and a level 5 FF/Rad...) can solo here, two or more characters grouped would be outmatched? Preposterous!

If I could drive like an Indy Racecar Pro then do I have a case for upping the speed limit dramtically? Is it fair for me to say, "Well everyone else should learn it at my skill level". No, that's not fair, nor is it wise.

It would be perfectly fair if we were talking about race tracks -- and we are.

You want a challenge, and after the fix yellows and oranges will provide that for you. While whites will provide it for the majority of players. Like I said before, white = optimal, which is the majority. Yellow/orange = skilled, which is your level.

This cannot be allowed to be the case. It would make groups totally unworkable under current conditions, and it would basically mean the devs would have to balance two or more separate games at once. If we're all playing the same game, we all have to be on the same page as far as difficulty is concerned.

I just took a DM/DA Scrapper to level 11 in 19 hours of gameplay. I had fun up to a certain point.

This morning, I hit level 11. Every contact I have sends me into Steel Canyon for my next missions. So, he's parked there now. Not playing him again until the over-powered villains are fixed. And, yes, before anyone starts flaming me: they ARE over-powered.

Why are they overpowered? At level 11 you have all three DA shields. You can employ whichever countermeasure offers the best defense for the situation at hand. I can't see any reason why a level 11 DM/DA can't fight +0/+1 mobs.

Two WHITE-conning Bricks getting my level 13 Invul Tanker into the RED by repeatedly stunning me and shutting off Temp Invul, only to bash me into a bloody pulp, before I can even get ONE of them to croak, and you don't see a problem?

The only problem I see is that someone didn't buy Unyielding Stance -- a level 8 power for Tankers.

The point is, by that time, a character will have plenty of powers, primary and secondary, to be able to come up with a good strategy for any situation. When you're in the lower levels, you just don't have that many options, and the options you DO have are negated by all the holds and stuns.

You already should have the countermeasure to "all the holds and stuns", but it looks like you don't. Care to elaborate?

On a related note: "lazy" is hardly the word I would be using. "Easy" I can agree with, but not "lazy". After all, EXCLUSIVELY fighting blues and greens would take you DOUBLE the time to get to the next level than if you would take on, say, whites and yellow exclusively. Thus, not lazy, since working hard is the exact opposite of that.

As it happens, lazy people very often end up doing more work than their more industrious fellows.

Okay, I have to keep being an [censored] about this, I can't help it. Did you try it with an Invul Tanker, like I did? Fire/Fire is an über-build (from what I've read on the boards) and has an AoE power.

At the levels we're talking about how "uber" do you think any build could possibly be?

You made a movie of your victorious fight? Whoop-dee-doo! How do I know you just didn't get lucky? You have NO EVIDENCE!

That's a totally unreasonable position. You are basically calling me and Aurora liars.

Do you really think the devs simply read the message board and act on what's said here?

I think what gets said here gets taken into account and has more weight than you want to admit.

Case in point: Phantom Army. This power was never intended to be used as a damage-dealing weapon. It was changed in a manner contrary to that purpose. It has since been changed, twice, in fashions intended to return it to that purpose, and the reason given by Geko was so that the power would better meet player expecations of it. Those changes were not made as a result of datamining; they were, apparently, made as a result of what was said on this forum.

Besides, I'm supposed to be a superhero in this game. How often does Batman, Superman, or Wonder Woman have to go to the hospital?

Less often than Aragorn did; does that mean characters in fantasy MMOs should never lose their fights, either?

You do realize that is incredibly rare don't you? I think it's a safe bet that 99% of the player base can't do this. Short of seeing a demo file I'm VERY skeptical that even you can do this, especially if it's in the hollows and the mobs are even conned.

I don't have time to reply to the rest of this, but here:

Level 5 Broadsword/Invul vs. Outcasts
Level 5 Broadsword/Invul vs. Trolls

There's interference on the play in the second one as a good samaritan came to my rescue near the end, but I think it gets the point across nevertheless. I did fail the first one twice; I tried doing it with just one Luck.

Build was: Hack (Acc/Rchg), Slice (Acc/Rchg/Dmg/Dmg), Resist Physical Damage (Res), Temp. Invulnerability (Res). Inspirations used were two Lucks, one Discipline and either two or three Respites. I did not use any inspirations that dropped during either fight. Note that Invulnerability offers no defense against the Outcasts' elemental attacks at this level, so this is hardly optimum. It was easier with the Katana/SR build. Dark Armor should do well, but Regeneration might not be up to the job. Of the primaries only Claws and Martial Arts are problematic as neither has an AE at level 5.

I shot these tonight on Infinity. Where, by the way, someone should tell people that the Hollows is a horrible deathtrap, no one can survive, etc. because frankly, the zone was crowded. Took me forever to find the spawns for these shots.

As far as I am concerned, this puts to rest any complaints about the difficulty in the Hollows. The zone can be soloed. If it can be soloed, then it is not too difficult for groups, and as it is a Hazard Zone it is intended that groups hunt here. If anything, the zone may be too easy.