biostem

I can kind of you your point in regard to the first thing you mentioned - but you do get your AoE hold pretty early on. I suppose domination wouldn't really do anything for the invisibility powers or pets, though. As for a mastermind primary set - that could be interesting. What if you got the phantom army as your T1 and T2 pets, only the T1s have weaker attacks and the T2s have some control abilities, and the T3 was the phantasm? You could have a weak spectral wounds, a strong spectral wounds, and maybe a more damage-oriented version of flash as the 3rd attack, and possibly group invisibility or spectral terror as the "special power" that all MMs get.

I'd love to see this, but I fear that illusion may be *too good* on dominators...

I'm so sorry! For some reason, I thought this was about tankers. *facepalms* Ice armor is a good overall set, but I can only really speak about it in regards to tankers. My apologies...

Understood. Do you think it would be too good if everyone that used a blast set could choose between the base and sentinel lineups, as a starting point?

Except that the tier 3 mercenary pet is a heavy weapon specialist, not a commander/leader. Mercs basically consist of generic submachine gunners, (and a medic), 2 swat-like riot police/CQC/breaching specialists, and a heavy machine gunner - they're actually more of a rag-tag bunch of misfits than an actual tight-knit and highly disciplined military squad.

I played an ice armor/stone melee tanker on live, so my experience may be a bit outdated. That being said, I would generally save permafrost until ater, if there are other powers you'd rather take. While, over the long term, icicles will actually be one of your most damaging powers, you can always grab it later, and primarily rely upon chilling embrace to help keep aggro on you. Hibernate can be a great "oh sh*t" power, but IIRC, it can cause you to lose enemy aggro, which can be very dangerous when teamed. Do slot up energy absorption ASAP, as it is a real game-changer!

Create a macro that includes petsayall em eat, then use powexectray to easily trigger the macro, and you'll eliminate the issue. As for me, I just cannot tolerate the psi blast sounds for extended periods of time, so that set is a hard pass for me. Similarly, illusion's lack of decent control abilities early on make that set quite un-fun, (for me).

I've dabbled in the set, and from that, I can tell you that you're trading raw defense for a lot of utility. If you want maximum survivability, then look elsewhere, but if you want a ton of tricks and other buffs at your disposal, then ninjitsu is for you...

This would undoubtedly require a lot of work, but I think it could add a new dimension to the game. My initial inspiration for this idea came from how Sentinels have blast sets that are slightly rearranged from what other ATs get. To this end, what if there were several options for each set made available to us, with powers and their related stats, being adjusted to account for the new order. For instance, maybe I want to get speed boost a lot earlier on my /kin corruptor. OK, well then its end cost, recharge, or overall buff may be modified to account for that. What if my mastermind wants the assault bot sooner - it'll be weaker than its original counterpart or otherwise adjusted. Your thoughts? Thanks!

How about allowing us to use influence to respec our characters? Perhaps base the cost on character level and the number of paid respecs they've used...

You should be able to use /camreset as part of a bind, if you want to go that route...

I've never tried combining tactical arrow with a different primary, so I can't speak to that. For fire as a primary, though, take a look at martial or plant for the secondary. Plant, in particular, is nice because its immobilize is magnitude 4, so it can affect bosses with only 1 application.

I'm gonna go against the grain here and suggest archery/bow manipulation (or whatever the archery secondary is called). Not only do you have a great mix of single target, AoE, buffs, and debuffs, but you also get a status protection toggle and an nice auto-power that boost recharge (among other things). Make sure to choose the "no redraw" option under power customization during character creation, and I think you'll enjoy it!

Well, regarding thugs getting leadership and mercs not, I look at it like this: As the gang leader, you rely upon your enforcers to backup your regular thugs and the bruiser. As the leader of a group of mercenaries, you are the squad leader, and just order them around more directly. I realize that a lot has to do with thugs coming later, and I certainly agree that mercs need some love, but both sets function quite differently...

What's funny is that when the game went F2P, anyone could basically create a 2nd account and have a female character just do that... *shrugs* If they had created some generic MM templates when they were first creating MMs, they could have allowed you to just set various different costumes for your henchman. My own thinking is that they were pressed for time, so went with the "hard coded" appearances that we ended up with...

Except that there's no bubble that you have to remain in - the caster uses the power, and anyone in the initial AoE gets tagged with the power and gains fly, as long as the toggle is maintained, regardless of whether you remain in the AoE in which the power was initially cast.

DCUO has a shield throw power, though you only throw a generic disc-like object, (last I checked). The thing is, since shield defense is a completed set already, it'd have to go somewhere else...

So I've been doing some reading up on the Malta Operatives, Knives of Artemis, and Vahzilok, and thought it'd be cool if we had a tech/science-y control primary for controllers and dominators. I'm drawing from several different sources here, but please give me any feedback you may have. Thanks! 1. Immobilizing dart - single target immobilize, similar to the one from the blaster ninjitsu secondary. Minor toxic DoT, also imparts a speed, recharge, and regen debuff, with a small chance to put the target to sleep. 2. Taser dart - single target hold. Does moderate energy damage and drains some endurance. 3. Toxic dart barrage - cone immobilize, dealing toxic DoT, debuffs speed, recharge and regen. 4. Hallucinogen dart - single target confuse 5. Flashbang dart - ranged aoe disorient, also debuffs defense and tohit. Minor smashing damage. 6. Corrosive dart barrage - targeted AoE that creates a field/puddle on the ground. Enemies passing over it are slowed, take moderate toxic DoT, and have their damage resistance debuffed. 7. Sapping gauntlet - basically, this would be similar to life drain from dark blast, only it drains a target of a small amount health and energy, and restores it to you. The enemy would be held while this is in effect. 8. Paralytic dart barrage - cone hold, deals moderate toxic damage, debuffs movement, recharge, and regen. 9. Summon gun drone - as per the devices power.

And now that I think about it, that's probably why they went with the shield charge power instead...

Also, depending upon how much you're willing to share with people you team up with, it may be a good idea to include something regarding how it may be difficult for you to communicate with your teammates...

This would require a lot of work, but what if 'group fly' was simply changed to an ally-targeted toggle, which was applied in an AoE - said allies then retain flight until you deactivate the toggle or they cancel the power from under their status bar? Maybe give it a range of 100' or something if it'd be too good otherwise, (so there's no need for them to stay in the bubble)...

Well, test it first, just to make sure it works to your liking. Once you've done that, you can do /bindsave to save your current binds, then /bindload to load it up on any subsequent characters. Just be aware that this is machine-specific, (unless you manually transfer over the keybinds.txt file).

One nice thing is that the immobilize in /plants is mag 4. I couldn't say much beyond that, though...

Understood & so-noted. Maybe if your pets are at full health, unsummoing them could just instantly recharge the associated summon power, and maybe they could add a meta-upgrade power, which only becomes available if you have both of the upgrade powers already, and both are recharged, which applies both upgrades at once...

Well, can't you just make use of whatever subroutine gets invoked when you zone? I mean, I know I'm drastically oversimplifying things here, but a function like that already exists. I mean, I guess an alternative would be a special form of "passive" that you command your pets with, which basically phases them out and makes them invisible while you travel...