biostem

I totally forgot about the Talons! Yes, they have a nice selection of earth powers: Upthrust Targeted AoE, Moderate DMG(Smashing), Minor DoT(Lethal), -Fly, Chance to Knockdown You channel seismic energy into the earth, causing a micro-fault to erupt under your target. This causes a shard of rock to thrust upward out of the ground, dealing smashing damage. The force of the eruption also hits players with shards of rock, causing bleeding, can knock flying targets out of the sky, and knockback enemies. Shards of Stone Ranged Cone, Moderate DMG (Lethal), Moderate DoT(Lethal), -Fly, Chance to Knockup You launch a volley of stone shards at your target in a sweeping cone. These shards stab into the target, causing lethal damage. The force of the attack can also knock flying targets from the sky and has a chance to knock up ground targets. Ash Fall Summon You create a choking ash fall at your target's location. This hits any targets caught within its area of effect on an ongoing basis, but can be avoided if the area is evacuated.

Some Legacy Chain enemies have a "propel rocks" and "propel boulder" ability and Earth Assault has "stone spears". Would this just be a knock-up/back-heavy set, or would you give it some other gimmick?

I feel that any discussion about what sets are over- or under-performing is highly subjective, and since people use different metrics, such a discussion is more likely to trigger an argument than come to any sort of agreement. What I want to see are more options made available, and existing powersets tweaked to fill different niches, instead of all being placed into lock-step with one-another. Solo, I couldn't care less. On a team, if certain sets are drastically under- or over-performing, it can kill any motivation some people have to keep going - it is important for folks, (who aren't just looking to leech XP while door-sitting), to be able to contribute in a meaningful way. Well, if it isn't important to you that any character can contribute meaningfully in a team environment, regardless of what powersets or AT they play, then it wouldn't occur to you. If you don't like having to carry a team or being carried by others, then you want there to be a certain baseline of effectiveness for any given player/character. More important? I'm not sure. Important in a general sense, sure. If the devs want to put forth an objective metric that all sets will be measured against, then we can actually determine what needs "love" and what needs the nerf bat...

There are already many powers one can get fairly early in there career with cooldowns that are on the long side. Maybe if such "limit break" abilities were inherent or such, I could see them being available early on, but not in lieu of a more regularly available/useful power...

Thanks! She's a dark melee (for the drains/siphons) & shield defense brute.

Here's my go at a version of 'Maple':

Why not use trick shot for the middle attack?

I'm all for the cape with collar & shoulders, only collar, only shoulders, or just the cape!

I have a DM/EA brute that I rather like. My namesake was a DM/regen scrapper back on live. I just found dark armor to have too many things going on at once, for my liking. It's not bad, just "high maintenance"...

Give the ninja the immobilizing dart from the ninja blaster secondary and the rebounding shuriken from the martial assault set.

NP. I think that MM pets' powers are rather hard to change. To one of your earlier points - I dislike how we're basically shoehorned into magical zombies, so more options would be great. I can only hope that the implementation comes sooner rather than later...

I was referencing that to point out that the devs are making strides toward pet customization...

There are many many requests for MM pet customization. I'm all for more options, but my current understanding is that it is quite difficult to do. There are some other CoH servers out there that have implemented some options, but I don't have firsthand experience to comment on how good said options work. Do please check out the customization on illusion control's decoy power, though...

You can't truly call yourself a member of The Lost until you're wearing an old picture-tube TV case on your head...

Ice blast has a lot of tools at its disposal, and while frost breath is a closer cone, it's not a must-have, IMO. It can also totally lock down a boss via the 2 freeze rays. Devices has received a lot of buffs, too...

Thanks Redlynne! I don't suppose you could put the names with those gifs? Thanks again!

Aye. It kind of feels like the AT had a random conditional buff/debuff power shoved down its throat, rather than a genuine class mechanic. What about some sort of simultaneous debuff effect AND HoT effect, which scaled one way or the other, based upon how high/low your health is? The higher your health, the stronger the debuff applied to the enemy & the lower your health, the greater the HoT is that's applied to you...

Welcome to CO's older brother! (Cousin? Father?). I agree that the dance emotes could use some love. There are a few decent ones, but then, I'm not the best judge of dance style... 😤

At least with alpha strikes, part of the problem is how enemies in the same group tend to all recognize you and attack in perfect synchronization; If there was a little variability to simulate differences in reaction time, things may go better...

Here's an idea, (though in practice it may be a little too similar to absorb); What if, for every set interval, you built up a stack of "reactive healing", and should you take damage, those stacks are consumed to provide a burst of healing, (in the form of X HP per stack). Basically, it wouldn't absorb the damage, but quickly heal you back up, using what you've accumulated between battles. It may not be too useful in the thick of a fight, but it'll help with those alpha strikes, (as long as you can survive the initial hit).

I was happily surprised with the performance of my dm/ea brute. I was also pleasantly surprised with how things went with my nature/rad defender. I'm having a hoot with a savage/regen brute that I've been playing, lately...

I don't like how 'opportunity' is tied to your 1st 2 powers. I'd love to see a mechanic where you can choose when to use it, instead. Honestly, I don't even bother with the defensive opportunity - the heal is so minimal it seems pointless...

Should the can of worms be opened?

Can we please please please have a feature added to save/retain the last few colors we've selected, so I no longer have to remember "4th column, 3rd row" or some such for each color I'm using? Also, is there any way to hook auras up to activate only when a travel power is enabled, or something similar? Thanks for all your hard work!

Well, sure there are; Patterns have to be adjusted to fit to the piece they're being applied to - Just look at how capes, shields, and skirts that accept patterns look slightly different than the torso or pants. Many hair options also have things like a blend or differently colored strands/bangs, instead of basic color/pattern options, so those would have to be totally rebuilt. All this isn't including the drastic differences between the 3D geometries of hair, whereas pretty much all the torsos/pants are the same, and those that differ drastically don't allow said pattern options...