MTeague

I admit, this is why I like the Vanguard projector shields, or the "Gem Shield" option (which I can headcanon is Force-Field shield, so it just vanishes when not in use)

Tankers are in a very good spot now. They were gods before the June patch. However, if you go back a year or two before that, I saw many people saying basically "Why bring a Tanker, just use Broots?" But that very same patch that make Tanks do very good AoE damage is when more than a few decided they were done with Brutes. Me personally, I will always have some of each, because my OCD demands I have a perfect distribution of ATs in my character roster. (No, I don't make sense. I'm mostly OK with that). But there are a lot of people who do very much go by numbers and spreadsheets, and want to make sure their favorite AT isn't "a waste". I have never seen a point where all four melee AT's felt like they were simultaneously in a good spot.

All things are possible (well, not really, but people like hearing that). So, if the Devs choose to create this, I will be curious to see the final result. However, we already have people saying that there's no good "niche" for Stalkers, and Scrapper, and Brutes, and Tankers, that one of them is always going to be left out in the cold. Given that, I would be surprised if they chose to great a Fifth Melee archtype, and I would be very very surprised, if they chose to provide powersets that were a mix of armor toggles and melee attacks. That said, I have been surprised before, many times. Honestly, if you want to feel decently safe in melee, and stab and slash, and still provide support to teammates, Night Widow says Hi.

Cautiously optimistic on the idea. I don't always like the fluffy-nether looking parts of Dark Blast, so sometimes I use a different blast set recolored pitch black / black with just a hint of really dark blue. But then I'm no longer doing Negative damage. This would take care of that angle of things. Or a "Nuclear Fire" that's Fire Blast recolored green, but not really radiation energy, if I just don't care for eye beams or the trash that is neutrino bolt on that character. Again, this would allow selection of what was truly desired all along. I do think you'd rapidly see Flavor-of-the-Months where people lean hard into a percieved advantageous damage type, and then wail and moan that they want to re-select that damage type the next time enemy resistances are rebalanced. But the devs are not incapable of saying "No. Too Bad For You.", so that's an acceptable risk in my book. But I do think, the devs will never made this change, without also doing a top-to-bottom review of existing enemy resistances, and adjusting things here and there.

As a Travel Power, Super Speed is adequate. Especially with the Stealth and with Speed Phase. If you're looking for something that makes it feel like your character races around the battlefield in the blink of an eye, like Quicksilver in the X-Men movies, Super Speed will not do that, and was never even once designed to do that. Ever. The closest you can come to that in City of Heroes is a /Martial Combat blaster, and probably using Speed of Sound rather than Super Speed. Speed of Sound still lets you zoom down the street. The zooming is very important. Speed of Sound also gets you Jaunt, for 3 quick short range teleports around the field, as if you were moving "faster than the can follow". /Martial Combat - Burst Of Speed gives you 3 additional PBAE teleport punches, again, emulating you smacking people around without them able to react. /Martial Combat - Reaction Time gives you a wide area PBAE movement debufff and recharge debuff, again, making you feel faster than everyone else around you. It's never going to be the "Sweet Dreams are Made of This" from the X-Men, but hey, it's way more than the Super Speed power pool does for you. /Martial Combat - Ki Push, can also be interpreted as you punching someone, and moving so fast that you can attack them 2-3 times while they still are flying through the air. But do be aware. There is NO powerset, in the entire game, that is ever going to make you really feel like Quicksilver.

Lo, verily, even eldritch horrors from the dawn of time can be brought low by bureaucracy.

Yes, that would change my opinion. https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Aegis:_Psionic/Status_Resistance already exists. It's only a 20% status resistence, not 50%, and it's a unique. So I imagine that any new IO set pieces they introduced with a big chunk of resist would also be unique, and might well have a higher lvl requirement. But that's a difference in degree, not a difference in kind.

I won't say I've never seen the request before. There is clearly demand out there, and if the HC devs feel it is in the best interest of the game, it would be their perogative to introduce such IO's if they see fit. Personally, I don't believe it's necessary. I have levelled plenty of characters, soloing them about 60% of the time. It's not that that bad to deal with. Either you bring the occasional Break Free, or you scan the group in front of you BEFORE you aggro, identify any sources of mez, and one-shot them with a Snipe, or you land some kind of Whammy support power on them (Freezing Rain, Sleet, Gust), or a damage patch that makes them run (Rain of Fire, Caltrops), or you use your own mez powers on them (Mass Hypnosis, Confuse, etc). (and yes, Knockback powers, followed by 2-3 blasts in rapid fire before they recover, is a wonderful solution to the problem!) Sure, it's nice to have a status protection toggle or clicky. I won't dispute that. But honest, many generations of blaster, defenders, controllers, corruptors, dominators, and masterminds handled it just fine from the launch of the game down until today/now. Having to plan for it before you attack a mob, is the price of not being the melee who charges first into the fray.

It would be more efficient by far to let your pets keep attacking, and hand out a wakie. Or go wild and crazy and take the Resuscitation power from Medicine.

No objection. That said, if you happen to realize it right away, you can ciick into the chat line, then up-arrow to get the original /macro command back into the chat box, and adjust thataway, then press enter. But you're S.O.L. if you don't realize until an hour later, or your next logon. Certainly just another right click option "Edit" "Edit Macro Name" would be easy to use, and could leave the existing edit option untouched.

Sport Burst is nice for a few free hits, but it won't last on the group you're focusing on. I was leery of opening with Spirit Tree at first, but it does a pretty good job of taking the alpha and causing mobs to clump up nicely for seeds. Seeds needs strong slotting to have a decent duration now, but once slotted, it gets the job done. They attack each other, you get more free hits, and mop up the easy quick XP. Once mobs are clumped up, AE Immob to keep them clumped up. Psychic Scream isn't my favorite power, but from 16-30, it's a serviceable AE attack to tag all the mobs you hit with Seeds. At low levels, soloing, I enjoy sending mobs flying with TK Thrust. Once I have decent number of slots in the midgame, I do tend to slap in a KB-to-KD. Technically, I probably don't have to, because the AE immob should keep them in place, but I don't always time when the AE immob needs refreshing well. Also, TK Thrust is smashing damage, which is nice to deal with various Psi-resistant mobs. Mind Probe is still the bread-and-butter melee attack, though.

It's even crazier when you realize how few of these "offices" have desks, chairs, cubicles, anywhere a person could actually pretend to accomplish anything. Even the high tech labs, apparently, every scientist is on their feet every hour of every workday, and they all really enjoy sharing the small handful of terminals that exist. Oh, and having no cafeteria or break room of any kind.

The "Earth For Humans.. Let's Keep it that way", and the "They are still among us!" billboards, both definitely started as anti-Rikti notices. Whether governmental organizations wanted citizens to be extra alert for possible alien infiltration, or whether or not private individuals full of (potentially justified) paranoia paid for them to go up, I think is never truly specified. But I have always assumed the world of Paragon City has it's fair share of humans who don't just fear and hate the Rikti, but who view any form of intelligent life that isn't "pure" human as a threat to humanity's continued existence. Rikti, of course would be hated by them. the Lost, in particular, would be seen as an existential threat by them, since they're literally being converted to Rikti. But also, Dillo, or Grym? Both would be hated by them. Kheldians? Hated by them. Devouring Earth would be targetted by them, and with good reason. I mean, Hamidon. Terra. etc. Mutants of any kind, including every member of G.I.F.T, would probably be seen as impure, not-human-enough. Not unlike how many humans in the Babylon 5 Universe never trusted telepaths, ultimately leading to the Psi-Corps and finally the Telepath War. and of course, the X-Men are rife with examples of this. The Legacy chain and Midnighters would probably get a pass, since ultimately they're basically human casters. But any magical Beings, heroic or not, would probably be feared and hated by the same people who fund these billboards. I'm not going to draw parallels to current real world politics, because it wouldn't change anyone's mind anyway. But in the real world, for a very very long time, humanity has always been easily prodded to fear an "other". Whether via Religion / Sectarian conflict, whether tribal / ethnic conflict, etc. There have always True Believers who fuel that from genuine fear and hate, and always Demagogues who don't care but use that fear as a tool to push an agenda. Given that the world of City of Heroes is still full of humans, I assume it still wrestles with these problems as well, and some of the billboards are an in-universe acknowledgement of this. It can be leveraged for backstories, AE story arcs, etc, and hopefully in a tasteful / constructive manner.

Well, if that's too much walking, you could always go for a power kitchen session. Then you could Wok 500 miles, and then Wok 500 more. But you'll make an Awful lot of stirfry by the end of that.

Long term, you'll want the Staff Mastery Stance that increases damage. During levelling, when slots are at a premium, you may find the stance that reduces end cost or boosts recovery (forget which it is... Soul?) makes a big difference in how long you can keep that attack chain going. Also, if the "breakdancing" twirl-on-the-ground doesn't suit you, Eye of the Storm has an alternate animation when flying that you may prefer.

None of these are especially difficult, and you're talking about revamping every task force because they take entire minutes longer than you're happy with. Really guys? Admittedly, I am in Grumpy Old Man mode today, but hard no on the idea.

I understood that reference! (which... means I'm old.)

not a bad idea, though personally, I do not care for most of the seismic blast animations. Some of them, the animation looks like it should one-shot small neighborhoods, but it's still only going to do regular damage for that blast tier. I get what they were going for, but the disconnect doesn't work for me.

I would find it hard to come up with a proper themed character to use /Plant Manipulation, but I also haven't put a whole lot of thought into that prospect. Maybe Storm/Plant, for some kind of angry nature spirit?

You get a respec for free at lvl 10, and very possibly every 10 levels. (I don't need them that often) Should you need more, the oldschool "respec" task forces (Terra Volta, Nerva Archipelago) still exist. Should you need even more, there are respec recipes on the Auction House (Wentworth's / Black Market). The auction house is a good thing to familiarize yourself with, anyway. Even if you have no interest in invetions / IO Sets until you get a character to high level, you can typically sell rare (orange) invention salvage for 450,000 influence, each. That'll fund quite a few enhancements as you level.

I basically treat Unrelenting as a combat buff, with the option to save it and use it as a Wakie. Just like an awaken inspiration, there's no point to popping it if you're surrounded. If you realize you're going down, RUN. Get some distance from the mobs spawn point. They'll walk back and you can stand safely. Less useful than Rise of the Phoenix, yes. But it is a Pool Power self-rez, after all. Still. I wouldn't refuse it if they choose to buff the power more.

You're not alone. I mean, by the time you do all the mission arcs, you have a pretty solid grasp that Cole is Not a Nice Person, and that some very shady stuff is going down, and anyone who disagrees with him gets disappeared. But the single biggest question for the Resistance, that is the 95,000 lb behemoth in the room, is "OK, what's your plan for Hamidon / the Devouring Earth?". I've seen people say "Well, the average person thinks Hamidon is dead." I don't buy that. There's billboards all over the place reminding people about the monsters lurking behind the Sonic Fences. Provost Marchand outright talks to you about Hamidon during the tutorial if you choose Loyalist, and he's not acting like it's any state secret. He's honestly shocked if you ask "What's a Hamidon?". Maybe the Resistance assumes the state of half-truce with the Hamidon, with only occasional skirmishes will continue indefinitely, even if Cole were killed/removed. But that's literally gambling the entire species on that assumption. They should be smarter than that. Now maybe you have some true believers who say "It's better to die free than live a slave", and OK, some sympathy for that viewpoint, but it's one thing to gamble your own life, another to gamble all human life on the planet. Once we have contact with parallel worlds, OK, that's good, but the first step should be evacuating the remaining population, not trying to topple Cole.

If it matters to you, Everlasting has an outsized share of Redsiders. Redside was typically dead when I used to play on Excelsior. I could go entire evenings without seeing another player. There's still not a thriving metropolis in the Rogue Isles on Everlasting, but neither does it feel like you're stationed in Antarctica.

I want an alternate animation where Project Will hurls an NPC named Will at the opponents. Bonus points if it looks like Jonathan Frakes / Will Riker.

Ah. I appear to have skimmed over that. My apologies. No real objection there. It's already 40-45, so even flashbacked, you'd still have access to incarnate powers. (If it was 40-44, I'd be less keen on extending to 50)