Safehouse

I'll admit, part of why I've struggled to get "on board" with stalker is that I didn't like how all defensive sets sacrifice a skill for "hide." BUT, in the case of energy aura, "hide" is actually in the set in some form or another regardless of AT (energy cloak), so I feel like I'm not sacrificing a skill to play a set on stalker. That's just my personal preferences speaking. I guess my thing is - for me to choose stalker, I have to have a character whose thematic purpose really matches the AT? I'm rambling. BUT I'm inclined to believe you on it being a beast, just based on what I know of the archetype and powerset combo.

As far as secondaries go, I really highly recommend Energy Aura. Safehouse, my Energy/Energy scrapper, is hella fun to play. Plus I like the overall look of EA. I designed the character based on a theme, but the actual powersets feel like they play very nice together. Mind you, I'm still very early in leveling Safehouse and that could change. But with my experience with EA on my Kinetic/EA scrapper, combined with my experience so far on Energy/EA, I think the results are very promising.

Just popping in to say thank you, once again, to the devs for all your hard work ❤️

I love this idea. I think it does give a really unique flavor to the set that would differentiate it from the more single-target focused Beam Rifle and the "disintegrate" effect. Make "laser blast" be more aoe-centric, and the idea of straight-line AOE for the lasers enhances that sense of energy so concentrated it can "punch through" defenses. How would you think the balancing would work for this? I would imagine having the sniper do extreme damage to the target AND everything between you and them would be pretty intense. Or maybe not. I don't know. But maybe something where other enemies than the target take reduced damage compared to the primary target? I don't know, maybe I'm overthinking it. And the buildup to a "chain" effect also sounds really cool. I'm already getting ideas for a Laser/Energy blaster... 🙂

I don't know if anybody else has experienced, but I've noticed a really interesting alternate animation for X-Ray Beam on my Rad/Energy blaster. Sometimes, when I'm in a fight, I use an animation that is not actually available at character creation. When changing the look of your powers, you can choose either the default eye beam, or to shoot the lasers from your hand. However, I've seen a lot during missions - especially when I'm fighting a chain of enemies in rapid succession - that I sometimes do this really neat animation in which I take this hard step forward, kind of stomping my foot, and lean into my laser attack from my eyes. I don't know what the cause of it is, but it's a really cool animation to see during fights and gives this impression of "unleashing raw power!!" that looks bada**. Has anybody else noticed this animation?

I've loved a lot of the powersets in this thread, but this one is by far my favorite (I've also been posting in that other thread you linked), and I love the idea of an energy/fire set. I don't mind another energy blast set, personally. Consider me 200% behind laser blast. Devs, PLEASE make this happen!

Really nice to get dev feedback on this idea, even if it seems like it would be more of a lift than I thought it would be. Out of curiosity, would the inverse be more feasible or would we come up with the same hurdles? That is to say, for example: what if I wanted to use radiation blast, but wanted to turn the existing blasts that I currently shoot from my hands/eyes into the beams from beam rifle instead? In this case, I'd still be shooting the blasts from the existing emanation points (hands, eyes, so forth), but the blast itself would look like beams. Also count my vote in favor of a "beam blast" powerset 🙂

I am a huge advocate for this, personally. Currently Blue Bowshock, my Rad/Energy blaster, is just not quite the "thematic" fit I want him to be. I desperately long to be able to shoot laser beams from my hands and eyes. The idea of having cutting beam be an eye attack gives me chills just to contemplate. While Radiation gets closer to the "heat/plasma" power that I'm looking for, it's just not an exact fit. Energy blast, similarly, just isn't what I'm looking for. Aesthetically speaking, the "rifle" part of "beam rifle" isn't workin for me. I've created a character called "Alt Bowshock" who is Beam/Energy, in the hopes that maybe one day beam will get a change like this. If we never see it, that's fine, I can stick with my "rad" Bowshock. I'll just hold out hope 🙂 Would love one of the devs to weigh in on their thoughts on this, but I'm sure they're busy with other priorities right now haha.

I made a peacebringer whose backstory involves a character merging with a kheldian who has a strong love of the 80's, in particular synthwave/retrowave music. His costume and powers are colored in bright hues of blue, magenta, pink, purple, with a bit of gold and black. I went into this thinking "I really want to call him Neonstar, given his neon color scheme and cosmic powers," but I was dead certain that the name would be taken. Thankfully, I was dead wrong, and I'm pleasantly shocked to say that Neonstar now roams the streets of Paragon!!

Dang it, as always, I missed the window to donate. I'll keep my fingers crossed for next time!

I won't pretend to know the "meta" of what's a powerful combination. BUT, I will say a combo that I haven't seen represented much, if at all, in conversations is Rad/Energy Blaster. Anecdotally (I don't have numbers to back it up tbh), I feel like I hit like an absolute truck and the powerset combination is just incredibly fun. I recommend giving it a shot.

It all depends on what I'm feeling, but I haven't generally had any "statuesque" types yet, but I haven't really built the backstory for any characters who WOULD be statuesque. My current main Bowshock is about 5'11". Another character, Safehouse, a brash, hotheaded, cocksure young hero with strong powers and a Superman complex, is shorter than average, at 5'5", and it's a bit of a sore spot for him. He hates the thought that anybody would overlook or underestimate him because of the general association of "height" with "power."

My Kinetic/EA/Mu scrapper is my first - and currently only - level 50. I can confirm it's a lot of fun. I haven't fully kitted out my planned build yet, and I don't generally over worry about min/maxing, instead building my characters more around theme, but I feel really stronk, and like I'm generally pretty hard to hit. Yeah, there's a bit of a psi-hole, but for the most part I've adored it at endgame. Just want KM to get a little love 🙂

For the longest time, my forever character was Astellus, my Kinetic/Energy/Mu scrapper. Then I rolled my newest toon, Bowshock, who is still in the leveling process, although I plan for him to be a Rad/Energy/Flame Blaster. His concept is everything I didn't know I wanted out of a character. I like his backstory, as a guy who moved to Paragon and ended up having an encounter with a "mysterious, extradimensional entity" which in my mind is some sort of Lovecraftian beast. The encounter seemingly imbued him with the enhanced strength, energy manipulation, and strong heat powers. (I kind of preferred to take "radiation blast" as a representation of intense heat, rather than fire.) Conceptually, I love the character as somebody who doesn't have a big laundry list of "phenomenal cosmic powers" or who isn't godly. He just... becomes powerful in his own right by training and mastering his heat/energy powers to the degree that he can even shoot from his eyes a la Cyclops! I also really like the aesthetic I came up with for him, costume-wise. Even his dark matter aura, combined with changing his energy powers into this deep red-yellow hue, has given him a nice sense that he is manipulating some kind of "exotic energy" without him looking too dramatic or bizarre. He's just a dude with cool powers. Plus, he's been hitting like a TRUCK. I never considered Rad/Energy for this character concept until one day when I randomly decided to roll him. While I wish the blasts looked more like the beams from beam rifle (that would be AMAZING), he just has been unexpectedly powerful. I can't wait to get him to level 50. I haven't wanted to play a single other character since rolling Bowshock.

Never have I spent more time hovering my mouse between the "laugh" response and the "sad" response.

You're probably right, I do have vague recollection of people saying "EA is crap, no touch." Joke's on them, my main was an elec/regen scrapper on live 😛 Heh, yeah I could do whole threads about EA too!

I freaking love Energy Aura with Kinetic Melee. It's just a delightful combo. I can't recommend it highly enough. I don't know how I slept on EA when the game was live but I always ignored it.

Makes total sense to me, and I'd be 100% in support 👍🏼

Okay, cool, thanks for clarifying. The visuals and the numbers in your previous post help too! Always appreciate seeing the data 🙂 I just wasn't sure I had the right understanding of it. So from my persepctive, even if I'm able to perform my next action almost immediately after unleashing burst, that looong start-up before the hit just feels too much. Maybe making it function a little more like whirling mace and fire sword circle is all that would be needed, but right now it really does feel so slow and laggy.

Sorry, I'm not sure I follow, do you think you could explain what you mean when you're talking about whirling mace/fire sword, vs Burst? Are you saying that the extra "wind up" for burst is making it lag more? Because basically you don't get "hit" until the end of the chain of events, as opposed to fire sword circle having the "hit" at step 2?

So as of this post, my KM/EA scrapper is my first, and only, level 50. I have so much love for Kinetic Melee, and it comes this close (holds up thumb and forefinger) to actually achieving what I want that character to be, thematically. It does, however, fall short. What I love: The "twisty" energy. If you look at the way the energy itself moves when you attack, it's like little spirals of power. The combination of melee and ranged attacks. It's exactly the combo I always wanted to create for my "battlemage" style character. It sometimes feels like I am playing on an assault/defense archetype, and that's so cool. Among the melee sets, this truly feels the most unique. It's super fun to play. What I feel needs work. Lots of folks have already touched on this but: Animation times. Especially for Concentrated Strike and, to a lesser degree, Focused Burst and Burst. There could be other attacks that need the AT trimmed, but those are the big three that need some love. Nobody wanted to be a "corpse blaster." Animations themselves. I'm sure plenty of people like the animations just fine, but I strongly advocate for alternate animation options. An option for simpler punches, or maybe even a third animation option to have more of the street brawler look a la street justice, would be awesome. For me, personally, alternate animations to be less hand wavy/jazz hands, would actually, thematically, complete my character. I know that's really my unique scenario, but I imagine I'm not alone in feeling this way. Sound design: we've seen "Nascar melee" thrown around and I agree. BUT, more to the point, my main issue is the lack of impact that the sounds design has. When you strike an enemy, it really doesn't FEEL like you've hit them hard. On the less aesthetic side of things: damage. Maybe improving animation time could fix this, but I seriously feel like the set needs a damage pass, even if after seeing how animation time fixes affect damage. Power Siphon. I'd honestly be all for Power Siphon just being replaced with the stalker Build Up, but I could get behind changes that have been suggested elsewhere in this thread. At the end of the day, I think lots of my biggest issues with the set (even though I love it!) are more aesthetic than anything else. But, aesthetics has value, and can be an important aspect of WHY people choose not to use the set (or why folks choose TO use the set). I'm a proponent of "more options," and I feel KM is one of those sets that would benefit from such.

Gimme gimme gimme!!

Not sure how the logistics would work but I think it's an interesting idea. Case in point: my current main, Astellus, is a level 50 kinetic/energy/mu scrapper. As a result of a suggestion from the save kinetic melee thread, I'm now trying out a kinetic/energy/mu stalker. I've found the stalker to be really amazing. In this case, it's a matter of the exact same character concept/sets feeling better on another AT. I've more than once thought "gee, I wish I had built out the character this way originally, but now i have all these badges/achievements and I've invested all this time in kitting out Astellus..." So I think I would be interested in something like this, even if it's a one-time thing, or a two or three-time thing.

Agreed totally. Also, the focused burst point actually touches on what I think is a critical shortcoming of the set: the lack of synergy between the melee and ranged skills. I find my approach tends to be one of two things: either I Zapp from afar and then range mobs down, including focused burst/repulsing torrent in that rotation, or; I run up and melee enemies down, adding in ranged skills for spice and flavor when I'm feeling like it. On one hand, it's NICE that I feel like I have attacks available to me for all occasions, but on the other hand I would like to see the melee/ranged skills in the set synergize more.

I'm inclined to doubt they'll do that. I honestly think they're taking a solid approach to introducing new content. I really enjoy the new story arcs - they feel fresh and original, and I find them very entertaining. I'd love to see them take some of that creativity and build up the endgame a bit more too, but it's nice that the lower levels aren't being totally ignored either - they actually added content that falls in levels where I always find myself struggling.