MTeague

I like Mighty, but my Mind/Kin is constantly jumping into the middle of packs one foot behind the tank for Fulcrum Shift, so a PBAE is handy for him. EDIT: also, smashing damage for those darn psi-resistant robots

I would guess the complaint comes from people playing an Invulnarabiltiy scrapper/brute/tanker/stalker. (or comperable other "armor" powerset) Someone who already has constant-on status Protection, and therefore cares very little for the Mes Resistance. I still don't think the IO in question needs to change in any way. It does what it does. There are many other sources of Psi resist. Admittedly, most of them require more slots allocated. But you may already have attacks or cc powers or defense powers that you are already slotting up to the point where you can nab a Psi/Toxic resist bonus. If Psi Resist is a thing you need to cover against, it doesn't take many slots to shift to fit in a modest amount.

Sure you do. If you can build a character with them you can build without. It just becomes much more important then to also assemble a decent team with the buffs you're used to thinking of as superflous. Bubblers (of all kinds, not just FF!) suddenly become key, especially in a full team or league. And Hami-O's would become extra tasty once again.

I just tend to sugar daddy my alts with four ATO's from each of both of the two ATO sets, and slot them at level 10. Well. Start slotting them at level 10 anyway. I don't always have 4 slots in particular powers by then, but usually my bread-and-butter powers have 3 slots each by then. Then DO's for the rest until i hit 17, and by then my characters have earned enough merits to do some Converter Roulette to start filling in with attuned's in other powers. EDIT: that said, if you really WANT to use your merits on SO's... hey your merits your choice. SO's are NOT what I consider an efficient use of merits. But I can only criticize just so much with a straight face, knowing that sometimes I will drop 600 merits to buy all 6 recipies for a purple set Now-Dammit-Now when I really don't want to wait.

Options are always to the good. I do suspect this one iin particular would take a lot more programming than some others, but the more options we can get the better. Although, personally, I'd still like about 50% of the female boot options to have "flat" option instead of so many of them having 4-6 inch heels. I'm not saying take the heels away, just put in an option so I can have a similar looking boot that's flat.

re: Jump Kick. I've definitely seen it used on Homecoming. The animation is pretty nice. It's one of those powers I kinda WANT to like, but I just cant' quite get there myself because the damage feels too low to justify adding it to any melee attack chains. But it's definitely in the "fun to have" "this is not optimal" buckets. re: Fighitng pool attacks.: I've got Kick, Boxing and Crosspunch on my Beast/Empath MM, because the MM personal attacks are all crazy expensive on endurance, but the fighting pool powers are pretty cheap, and with all three, they're not bad. With all three you get like a 40% knockdown chance on Kick. Handy to keep a boss on his butt while the MM pets chew him up. Plus, if I melee with my pets, they're *definitely* in range for Supremacy and definitely in range for the MM pet-aura IO's. When teaming, maintaining the Empath buffs and spot healing where needed comes first, but the attacks are fairly serviceable. If nothing else, they make the MM *feel* far less passive.

While true, the NCSoft devs kinda at least *started* to open the door on that when they gave Kick / Boxing / Crosspunch it's synergy. I do think it each power needs to be looked at case-by-case though for, okay, is this underperforming now? Does it NEED any additional synergy bonus? Because Flurry, sure, I can see a case it needs some love. Hasten, not so much. There's entire threads arguing "leave it alone" or "nerf it" or "baseline it", but I think everyone can at LEAST agree that Hasten does not need to become Even Stronger. Jump Kick needs some love. Combat Jumping? Fine and dandy right where it is. etc.

Hey don't underestimate a good Swordfight Lecture

I like it. Would also allow for some "delayed" things... I'm thinking like the Doctor Graves arc, where you have to break the shield generators protecting Omnicore, etc, or the shrines anchoring Zephyr to his current form, etc, depending how the mission writer chose to implement it.

I think all four alignments should be kept. Maybe many players don't care two wahoos about them, but some of us really do care about these things for flavor and character concept. Similarly, I think all existing arcs, tip missions, etc, should be kept as they are. (or better yet, expanded upon). BUT, I would be fine with saying, "anyone can go to any zone". If a group of heroes wants to vouch for one of my villians, sure, why can't they work together while their interests, however briefly, align? Similarly, if some heroes want to help further a nefarous scheme in the rogue isles, well, why not? I can always tie up loose ends and dispose of the bod... er... *cough* reward them appropriately... later. I'd actually like my villains to be attacked by random blueside NPC's, or my heroes to be attacked by random redside NPC's, if I was on the wrong side but NOT teamed. No such attacks for Rogue/Vig because Rogue/Vig. Not saying an automatic PvP fest. But if squads of Longbow would attack me blueside, that would rock. Or even if Ms Liberty decided to kick me upside the head if i got too close to the new heroes under her protection. I'd even accept that trainers like that might need to be 100% impervious to all damage and all effects, because you can't take away someone else's trainer. But it would make me feel more like I was in enemy territory when NOT grouped up, and more liek "okay... you have a pass.... FOR NOW.... " when I was grouped up.

15 degrees feels extremely narrow. I get that the existing power isn't a tremendously wide arc, but I can MOVE with the existing power if I need to pick up things not already in the arc of effectiveness. Could we at least go a 30 degree arc? Having TK as an auto-hit toggle is very nice in that I can maintain it theorectically forever if I need additional hold mag. I acknowledge, the end cost of the toggle is substantial, but a Mind/Kin can sustain that end drain for an awful long time. Still, there would be a big boost to convenience in being able to position myself, click activate, and move onto the next thing. The hold durations look... short.... to me. I'm assuming it will make more sense after I read the other thread. EDIT --- now that I've actually read the other thread -- now it makes more sense it's not a click one and done cone power. it's a click and then periodic continual endurance cost to maintain the cone, until you use the temp power you propose to kill. So basically, a toggle-cone. also, I'm okay with the arc now, given that yes, I see that I COULD change my position and facing if needed. It could be irksome if i need to speed boost or other buff to allies while maintaining TK, but that's just different headaches and it at least wouldn't repel for forever.

I'm apparently in the minority here... About 1/2 my characters are redside all the way, but only about 25% of my characters take patron arcs. NONE of the blusiders, and only about half of my redsiders. The patron arcs just... very rarely... fit my characters theme. And I don't care what's most effective or not. If it doesn't make sense to me for my character to have a certain power, they don't get that power. Ancillary pools are often easier to fit in. Not always. But often there's one that meshes with a certain element or aspect of my primary / secondary, or an aspect of my character's backstory. Plus, I have pride issues. I don't need a patron to hand me power. I'm better than them anyway, whether or not I'm redside or blueside.

Well Presence I do think should be mostly focused on your character overawing or masking themselves somehow. Think Gandalf at the start of Lord of the Rings when he yelled at Bilbo. "Do not take me for some conjuror of cheap tricks! I am not trying to rob you!" THAT's what I want Presence to *feel* like. Of course, on the flip side, it's important not to fail your Presence check... as Loki found out when he told the Hulk that he was a god and would not be bullied by some dull creature.....

I was totally looking forward to a "Dr. Abraxus, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Knockback" writeup.

I think this is the best approach. Hasten is very thematic. It's in the Super Speed pool and it lets you do things very very fast. It's also extremely handy as currently coded for Controllers and Dominators (whether they are permadom or not). Hasten really lets you rapidly stack the magnitude of holds or other controls against EB's or AV's. A constant-but-weaker recharge boost isn't going to be NEARLY as useful, when you are, trying to get some lockdown on the Envoy of Shadow. It's right up there with popping a bunch of reds or purples. That said, yes, I have exactly ONE character who is taking the Presence Tree and that's basically for the Self-Rez for theme. Because he won't normally get a self-rez but character concept is that he's literally a "cannot die" type of character. Jack Harkness, or planescape torment Nameless One style. He always gets back up again even if not right away. Except for that concept, I'd never consider taking Presence. I don't ever want a Taunt when I'm on a character who doesn't normally get a taunting power in their primary or secondary. The Placate doesn't last nearly long enough to be of any use. The Fears have MUCH too short a duration and MUCH too long of a recharge to be useful, and the magnitude is only good for Lieutentants or Minions anyway. Teleportation could use some love, too. Long Range Teleport is ENTIRELY useless in the face of the base teleporter. I'd like to see Teleportation get a PBAE teleport attack like Marital Combat's "Burst of Speed".

I can say pretty decisively I would not use this. I don't object to it being created so long as it is OPTIONAL. Oldschool unresistable Quantums and Void Hunters kept me from levelling a Kheld at all, because I rage-deleted the character four times before level 14 and then just never created another one until homecoming when I found out the damage coudl at LEAST be resisted now. the nerdrage was very real, esp when they would show up in EVERY mission. Not like, 1 mission in 5, or be a rare encounter. There was apparently a Quantum Cloning Facility just CRANKING out the quants for the express purpose of ganking MY character, and it didn't matter what foes I was fighting... Council, Vahz, anything... there was going to be Quantum around. That crossed the line from "okay, I guess superman has his kyrptonite to watch out for" to "for the love of god, can I have ANY FUN at all on this character? Do I have to be two-shotted every time I turn around??". I would strongly recommend that if something like this is implemented, it actually be a RARE thing, and not 4-6 mobs per mission at regular difficulty settings, and clouds more at higher noteriety.

I didn't even get past the login screen lol

I'd just like Night Fall's animation to be one single wave of darkness moving forward, not shooting multiple "dark bullets".

Your idea is ... very clear. I doubt it will get much support. I'm giving it a hard no.

Technically, someone could have spent 100 merits for the recipe, crafted it, then posted the result for sale. That's... rather unlikely to be the case.... but in theory, could be. Perhaps for some folks. I get rather attached to my characters. My Spines/Regen stalker is not just my Spines/Regen stalker. He's FERIL. He has no other name. He is a literally unkillable mutant who grew up as a wild thing, and his earliest memories are of crawling through dumpsters, looking for food. As far as he can tell, his parents were horrified by his monstrous apperance at birth, and threw him into the trash. Perhaps placing him in a plastic bag first, perhaps not. But he did not die. His inherent regeneration kept him alive and he grew as a wild child in the streets of the rogue isles, learning that life is hard and cheap, and he must take what he needs to survive. He is functionally illiterate, but after leaving a trail of dead bodies in his wake, people learned not to taunt him about it. I don't need loot drops to stay invested in a game when I have that kind of attachment to my characters.

Really?

Except that the mechanic was literally designed to be BOOST to what you can normally do. Downtime in which you do not have a timed Boost, does not mean you're hobbling around on crutches. It means you're not boosted. It's like saying Defender damage is nerfed on teams. No it's not. It's boosted when they're solo. Now, admittedly, the HC Devs are not the NCSoft Devs. They may not view the timed mechanic of domination in the same way. They are under no obligation to maintain it just because that's how it's always been. But I mean, even reading the physical manual that came iwth my "City of Villians" game, it's clear that Domination was viewed as a temporary boost to be used for the really hard fights.... not unlike a Invuln tanks "Unstoppable" or a /SR scrapper's "Elude".... the performance you get from it was viewed, design wise as Extra, not "core".

Exactly. Now, there probably ARE some combinations that are more about being ranged more often than not.... Arch / Tactical Arrow comes to mind as "never need to be in melee".... but that's more the exception than the rule. /Fire Manip, /Elec Manip, /Energy Manip, etc,... most of the "Classic" secondaries.... all have very strong melee powers. You don't HAVE to take them, but they're really handy when something does get in close (and that'll happen a lot as you level....). Even /Devices, the Taser *used* to be Melee range, (it's still fairly short range), and of course Caltrops can be thrown only so far... and frequently, I'd toss it at my OWN feet to deal with mobs that had closed in. /Martial Kombat is probably the most extreme of this, given that you ahve a teleporting PBAE attack and 3 different melee kicks, as well as the melee Push.

I may just have to agree to disagree with you. I really don't see the question any different from "Some blasters can softcap all defenses by slotting careful with IO's. Other blasters cannot because they only use SO's. And therfore they die a lot more and they're glass cannons compared to tricked-out Blasters". Because really what makes the tricked out blaster so powerful there is NOT DYING. Being able to charge heedlessly ahead of the team or in a different direction from the team and not care. That is only achieveable via massive expenditures of IO's, just like Permadom. So I do not feel that I can call one into question without the other.

Even though the question was not aimed at me, I'll offer my $0.02 anyway. Yes, I think permadom as it stands is right in line with the rest of the game as it stands now. When Blasters can softcap all their defenses and have no end struggles and just melt everything at virtually no risk to themselves, yes, I think Permadom is not an out-of-bounds level of power to be obtainable. Both require MASSIVE slotting of IO sets to achieve, so i see no qualitative difference between a) and b). I understand that you do see such a difference. I do not. I also don't accept that a Dominator must give up all power and IO choices. I actually had NO IDEA what to to with my lvl 47 power selection or my lvl 49 power selection. I have every power I wanted. If I could have declined those power choices entirely in favor of 3 additional slots, I'd have done it in a heartbeat. At no point did I feel "forced" to choose anything. Now, is my Dom softcapped? No. Her defenses are about 27% melee and 29% ranged. But given how fast she locks things down, it's really not an issue. I don't have to dodge many attacks for very long. And since I'm Plant / Psi, with both a six-slotted Tree of Life (a "fun" power but skipped by many) and Drain Psyche, I have no trouble keeping her at full health / mana as she goes about merrily destroying away. I am willing to talk about how could Dominators be made more fun for those who only use SO's. But I do not think Permadom is any more "broken" or "unhealthy for the game" than I think it is to allow blasters or defenders or corruptors to be softcapped for all defenses. It's all part and parcel of the SAME power creep from the SAME source. Set Bonuses.