PaxArcana

If people are split on whether it's okay or not .... then, honestly? That means it's okay where it is, or at least, so very close to it that only tiny tweaks should even be considered. :)

Not necessarily. Yes, necessarily. Zero-sum game. Powers are balanced by an intersection of: Recharge Animation Time END cost Buff/Debuff effects Damage Range / Area If you improve any one of those, and the power wasn't especially underperforming? You must in return make one or more of the other points "worse". Furthermore, Powersets are balanced as a whole, by looking at the aggregate balance of all of it's powers, in total. Improve ONE power in a set, and - unless the entire set was underperforming in total - you need to weaken one or more other powers in that set, to compensate. ... And Poison is not underperforming. I regularly see people saying it's one of the better support sets out there, overall.

Take a page from Long Range Teleport. Fly - works like long range teleport, with an animation of zooming up into the sky, then the loading screen, then zooming down to a hard stop fifty feet up over whatever point is chosen for arrivals. SJ and SS - works only in-zone, you get to choose between the Trainer and any exits/transit points in the zone you're currently in. (IOW, no, it won't let you go directly to a new zone, BUT, you get to pick "my current zone's trainer" as an option, in compensation.)

... you have a level 50 character. You could be ROLLING in influence, millions of it (maybe TENS of millions), with just one afternoon spent on that character. Which you can then send to your new alt, via in-game mail. Game Balance. ... And seriously, I've got to say: if by level 30 you haven't figured out whether or not your secondary works for you ... then you've done something grievously wrong. Maybe less PLing/Farming, and more actually playing the game, next time? They made more money by NOT allowing it. The game was a Susbcription MMO - you paid monthly, to be able to play. The longer they kept you playing, the more money you kept paying. And there weren't any leveling shortcuts for a loooooong time - no AE, no DFB/DIB. Just playing, running missions, advancing from Zone to Zone. A shortcut like you describe, would halve the subscription fees they could expect to collect from you.

... DROOLIE, DROOLIE!! Seriously, that would be SO hardcore awesome .... if it were done right. And that one lone qualifier is the rub, isn't it?

Reroll a new character. If your old one is "SuperBob", name the new one "SuperBob II". Rewrite the bio to be a "reboot version" - like actual comics do all the time. With DFB and DIB, you can shoot to 30 in only a couple hours of playtime. Then RWZ to get to 50. Couple days, max.

THIS. This, right here.

If any amount of damage was added to Poison, then the buff and debuff effects would have to be weakened to compensate. Power balance is a zero-sum game, after all. Perhaps what you really want, is a Poison-themed attack set. Then you could, for example, be a Poison/Poison Corruptor. :)

At least half of any money put into a 401(k), comes from the worker ... not the employer. And ... my mother retired recently. She has a 401(k). It contributes 0 to her standard of living - in part because she's treating it like an emergency fund, and in part because she's extremely loathe to pay taxes on any withdrawals (obviously, hers is a tax-deferred 401(k) ...). And in return, I will say that (a) you're extremely lucky, and (b) I daresay your investment experience is significantly atypical. Most Americans these days not only cannot retire twenty years early ... some of them never feel like they can retire at all, and work right up until they die. :'(

... I hope that wasn't directed at me? 'cause my post was intended to be Economics, not Politics. :)

It's not just that - I don't think the human brain could handle a true "instantaneous teleport" movement power.

+1 Those NPCs aren't even Enemies. They're Allies.

That's not actually true. Once upon a time, it was actually all the little people saving their nickels and dimes that gave most banks the majority of the assets they could issue loans against. But nowadays, there's this little thing called quantitative easing. Banks no longer have to have assets in 1:1 ratio to the loans they give out - they are allowed to, in essence, create money out of thin air. And that's why savings accounts pay sh_t interest nowadays. It used to be, the bank would offer 2% , 3%, sometimes even 4% for a passbook savings account, with maybe fifty dollars in it. Because they needed hundreds of thousands of people to save a few hundred apiece, so that they could loan Moneybacgs McCEO two million for his latest capital venture. They don't need the small depositors anymore. So they stopped offering those interest rates as enticements to deposit your savings with THEM instead of the bank down the block.

For me, I mostly just slot whatever comes to hand. Once I hit level 22, I start slotting IO25's (which give 96% of the benefit of a +0 SO enhancement - an IO26 is exactly the same bonus as a +0 SO). Occasionally, if I have a recipe and the ingredients, I'll slot a higher-level IO. And since IOs never, ever expire? Once I've slotted one, I'm good until I get to a level where I want to start thinking about Sets and final, end-game slotting. And once I start putting IOs in, I start selling all the other enhancements that drop for me. ... And, for INF? play the market, kiddo! I've sold single recipes for half a million INF - not much to a 50, but a damned lot for someone level 25 to 30. :) I wouldn't want to save the recipe (if it's a level 22 Set IO, in a set that runs 20-50? I want 50s) ... and by selling it, someone out there on their 50 gets the 50 they want (through the magic of Wentworth's "eh,close enough" delivery system, hahaha).

Yeah, I can see that. To the person doing the teleporting, it was as you say. To anyone ELSE, though? You'd disappear from one spot, and a few seconds later, reappear somewhere else. In about as much time, total, as a CoX teleport, too; CO had you disappear faster, then STAY disappeared longer. Really, it's a matter of interface and control. In a single player game (e.g. Dishonored) you can have the whole game stop while you pick your target. In a multiplayer game, that just doesn't work.

I like the way Champions Online did "Teleport" (phase out, REALLY OMIGOSH FAST flight, then phase in - on a timer, so you were going to phase back in like it or not. And when out-of-phase, most graphics were suppressed and "blurry" (read: relatively low-rez), as well as being largely monochrome, they could in fact let you go HELLA fast, without your video card chugging out on you. Anyway, I liked that a lot better than CoX's implementation. Especially since the "phase out" part was nearly instantaneous, making it a MUCH better "ohcrapI'mabouttodie" escape option.

Where "many" actually translates to "nearly zero". Most retirees do not have investments to draw on. Even those who do, it's typically through a 401(k) plan or an IRA, which do not have the sort of returns you're implying. ... Also, NCSoft is a Korean company. I'm pretty sure most, perhaps all, of their investors are Korean, or at least, "not American" and so, not on Social Security in any amount.

... or use a keybind (mine is "Shift + Left-click"). As long as I don't run out of END, I can cross a zone at about the height of the 10th to 15th floor in perfect safety. Going END-o does mean going splat, though. :D ... should never have existed, IMO.

Water doesn't cause SS to slow down. I didn't say it did. But someone might still prefer not to get wet, anyway. Also, you have to find a way back up out of the water, which can take time to do. The guy in the air? Straight to B, no "where the hell is a set of stairs when you need one". Also, I note you didn't even try to address Faultline.

Define "one end to the other". How about, middle of the west side, to the middle of the east side ... without getting wet? SS and SJ alike would be absolutely screwed, for that one. Corner to Corner, again without getting wet? I'm honestly not sure if Fly will outpace both SS and SJ, but it's not as cut and dried as you obviously want it to be. ... But, hey, IP is as flat and LONG a zone as you can find in the game. Let's try it again in Faultline. North to south, no other restrictions. (Hint: SS loses the race.) Or, Crey's Folly, and back to "no getting wet". (SS loses again.)

Moving A to B, straight line, with little or no vertical element? SS should always win over Fly (and SJ should be in second place) A to B, with a couple turns to avoid large vertical obstacles? SS should drop back to second place, tied with SJ. Fly should still come in last. A to B, with large voids (or canyons, etc) to get over, a la the Shadow Shard? SS drops to last place (either it never gets there, or it has to go the looooooong way around to find bridges, stairs, and so forth), SJ stays in second place, and Fly finally takes the gold. That's the way it should be: the more vertical control you have, the less raw speed you have.

Make your villain, but on blueside ... run DFB up to level 20 ... visit Null the Gull, and switch to Villain. Pretend the blueside stuff never happened, you're just so awesome your character _starts_ at level 20 or 21. :) I'm not going to pitch a fit, but I am going to disagree. People are using DFB, at least in part, to try out new things - ATs, powersets, etc. It's a quick, easy way to speed level a new character to a level at which you can really get a feel for how they will play. Once they find the thing(s) they like, they keep playing those things further on. ((Also, blueside at least, I've gotten on plenty of TF groups within my level range(s) ...))

Yeah, so I've gone and looked at the complaints. The practices described are no different from any other big developer in the industry, for the past thirty-plus years. Looking on Glass Door right now (the source of all these "horrible employer" articles) I see a 3.5/5 star rating, >60% recommend, and >60% CEO approval. That's .... that's just not indicative of a hellhole employer. And most of the big complaints seem to be "salary is excellent for Poland but sucks compared to <other place(s)>" ... and to me, that's not a justified complaint. Not even close. If you could earn more working elsewhere .... GO, work there. Otherwise, STFU about it. EDIT TO ADD: by the by, there are only seventy-four reviews there. For a company that currently employs ~400 people. That's hardly "widely hated" ...

Sentinels don't get shields. .... well, that is a Proliferation that not only could I support, but would make reasonable sense, too. :)

Short answer: no. Long answer: Shield is a defense powerset. Blasters do not get defense powersets. As such, Blasters cannot get the Shield powerset.