Obus Form

If permanent buffs were given, I'd wager movement speed would probably be it such that people could skip their movement power choice at Vet level 1000.

This. Except I did it on 100s of winter packs. Bigger cost, same 25%, so bigger millions. But it's very clicking intensive opening 100s of packs and also putting all that salvage for sale. Side note: my experience is that ATOs and Winter IOs sell slower than other IOs. So it's a long term investment.

Rewarding the players with a global buff sounds similar to Diablo 3 paragon levels that provide global stats to your characters. Neat idea, and it provides another level of progressin. I think the reward itself though cannot be something that gives stats due to the way the game has hard/soft caps to def, resist, recharge, damage, etc. Therefore, giving free stats on a game becomes game breaking because now you can skip entire IO sets and slotting methods thereby opening up toons to power creep beyond IOs, e.g a blaster with innate 45 def and 50% resist across the board. Possible rewards may be just aadditional free exp for your alts so that you can power level your alts to 50 with a literal click of a button. E.g. Every 5 vet levels past 100 gives 1 level for any alt not at level 50.

General: As things heat up about the loss of damage on Electric Affinity's secondary effects (-end, -recov), I wonder about the game's 2ndary effects on other offensive power sets and the DPS cost associated with them. It would be nice to have a discussion here about other debuffs (-def, -res, -to hit, -end, -recov, -regen, -damage, -recharge, etc). Sidebar: Diablo 3 originally released with Cold, Fire, Lightning and several other damage types on weapons such that, when wielded by melee, would give "flavourful" effects: Cold-type weapons would slow mobs, Fire-type weapons added extra fire DOTs, and Lightning-type weapons had random chances to stun mobs. Because players unanimously chose Fire-type weapons for increased damage, Diablo 3 Devs (either before release or quickly after) standardized damage numbers across all elemental types (for melee weapons), thus "allowing" players to "freely" choose weapon types without losing DPS. This meant Cold, Fire, Lightning or other damage types became purely aesthetic (for melee players anyway). Wizards, however, because their damage HAD to be elemental (Cold, Fire, Lightning or Arcane), still benefited from Cold damage slowing mobs, Fire damage doing extra damage in screen-wide attacks, and Lightning damage arcing to enemies and sometimes stunning (if you choose that passive ability). The "play style" between the wizards Cold, Fire and Lightning damage types (I exclude Arcane because it's flavour feels less identifiable) felt amazingly different but was comparable in numbers. Although damage numbers changed from season to season (due to varying buffs to different Set Items), the damage numbers were comparable in normal content (Tier 13 rifts). For end-game (GRift levels) the Min-Max players ofc choose the damage type/Set Items with the highest DPS. but generalized end-game (Tier 13 rifts) could be completed across any damage type chosen. This felt easy to achieve for Wizards since Wizards will only ever have 4 powersets: Cold, Fire, Lightning, and Arcane. Extending this past Wizard elemental damage types, Diablo 3 also standardized it such at every Set Item's full set can now solo Tier 13 rift bosses with some degree of ease. Back to COH, then, normalized damage: I am wondering if this lesson can be learned from Diablo 3, specifically, whether or not damage should be normalized across power sets so that generalized content (Diablo Tier 13 rifts bosses, or COH level 54 bosses) can be "easily" killed by obtaining 99% + damage enhancement + Musculature by any offensive damage power set with the majority of the playstyle being felt at this level of content. By "easily" I mean that the 2ndary effects are not really effective before the lvl 54 boss dies. I think that the new development of 2ndary effect IOs, such as the newly developed End Mod/Damage IOs, are the correct way to boost 2ndary effects to "effective" levels, but I hope that "effective" = "controlling" iTrial AVs in some manner not offered by other 2ndary effects. 2ndary effect usefulness: Like Diablo 3, because mob kill speed is high, it feels (anecdotal evidence only) that the only useful COH debuffs (-regen, -rez) are ones that reduce AV kill time. This feels true (anecdotal evidence only) at lvl 54 TFs and even in iTrials, with several noted exceptions such as Hamidon mobs requiring CC. In order to make other 2ndary effect debuffs (-def, -to hit, -damage, -recharge, etc) useful, I think we will need boss mechanics that absolutely require these debuffs in order for the lvl 54 raid or iTrial to progress. If we follow along this path, but still want to keep 2ndary effects useful, it seems the only place left for 2ndary effects to be useful is iTrials AVs, in which case, we would need AV mechanics that can really show off the stacked effect of -To-hit, -Recharge or -End + -Recov, for example the boss doing a ton of damage AND having 95% to-hit such that any -To-hit, -Recharge, and -End + -Recov really relieves the tanks/healers.

Some of the higher level villain storu lines are well done and have interesting plot twists, compared to hero side (smash and rescue). Without spoiling, it may be worth your time to run them and read all the in game text, clues, dialogue etc.

I'm wondering if there are any ways to advertise the existence of COH homecoming on more mainstream outlets such as MMO gaming news feeds, etc. If people paid, and COH was willing, would the dev team ever consider putting a YouTube add?

Candidly, because my playtime is limited and the profits are juicy enough, I don't care for the difference between 5k or 50k for yellow salvage as long as I get to play City of Auctions Houses

Don't take this to the bank, but a long time ago, I recall one individual on the forums, who after exhaustively reading through all enemy powers realized that all enemy mob AOE attacks were also classified as Ranged attacks, except 5 or 6 attacks relegated such as Maurader's Nova Fist, any mob's Footstomp (Chronos Titan, Greater Devoured, etc.

Regarding lore interest or knowledge, I agree with you @Crimsonpyre. Funnily enough, I never read any game dialogues nor stories during my play from launch day when I was 14 years old. The only time I read it was when I saw Statesman die by Darren Wade's (who the fuck is no name Darren Wade?) stupid ritual circle. At least...die to our dimension's Rularuu dream doctor or someone with a powerful background. Then I decidedly read the entire lore bible a year after sunset, and now understand why everything is a Nemesis plot, and the unique story/birth of Rularuu. Sadly, I agree that (anecdotal evidence only) less than the majority of players are interested in the depth of lore this game offers. However, bringing back iconic statesman would be a great way (easy way?), lore wise, to introduce entirely new game concepts/zones/lore/powersets. I don't think Statesman needs to be popular, just iconic. As an adult reading lore, I find Statesman himself seems short sighted in his goals, lacking agency and long term strategy so clearly depicted by Recluse and the miss liberty TF that fights Recluse. If Statesman comes back he needs to do it in a ridiculously dramatic fashion like: - being infused with 1000 warshades/peaceboys required to resuscitate his incarnate body, giving him alien-origin godlike power, creating a new light/dark power set, and finally freeing him from the influence of the well - giving his soul (and thus body) completely over to the well to truly become the Well Incarnate, thus giving birth to the next set of incarnate levels. Thus we discover the true agency/motives of this anthropomorphic Well of Furies/Zeus that itself has fears/desires of the "plot device here" thing - the Rikti resurrect him, perfect control while he maintains his personality, unlike Hero One. With this we get a new power set, and more expansion or maps into the actual Rikti homework and learn about the peaceful Rikti who fear the battalion --> Batallion story time - we fight Batallion, and as a last ditch effort to survive, Recluse finds Statesmen dead body, clones him and we win --> Statesmen is actually a puppet but now leads the Freedom Phalanx, while Recluse is siphoning the incarnate/battalion powers for himself --> dr Jero story line from DBZ with androids and merging powers of everyone into 1 super being

Would suggest sentinel Archetype as the first type to play. It is tanky ranged damage dealer that is jack of all trades in virtually every category (damage output, survivability, crowd control, availability of AOE damage). Something like fire/will power or fire/regent for first time players

That animation, which was also seen in the mini promo videos, was the only reason I took that EPP. Devs, make or happen

Would love to see him return, and as an amateur writer and avid reader, also agree that bringing him back allows for deep and thorough storytelling that creates opportune moments of lore reveal, and other powers/factions development not yet revealed or fully understood. It could even give birth to entire new concepts.

I figure, it would have to auto disable all rez powers (temp powers, powersets, inspirations) and grey out the "Rez at base/hospital" button after you die. You could only stay there, dead, licking the pavement. Then log out. Edit: Or, like diablo 3, when playing "hardcore" mode, the rez power turns into a "prevent death" passive power with a cooldown, or turns into a "you almost died, take no damage for 5 seconds" with a cooldown. This would give sets with a rez power a useful power instead of a dead power. It would also allow sets with T9 Moment of Glory type powers... to actually be used in the exact manner for which they were designed. Also, /Stone Armor: Granite Armor is suddenly useful again.

This reminds of WoW's Wrath of the Lich King expansion raid, Argent Tournament. The story premise of Argent Tournament raid patch was a tournament to find the strongest players (and of course gear up players) suited to fight the Lich King in the next patch update.

Someone previously suggested, and I agree, having a Hardcore mode would make the game 99.99% more interesting - forces careful selection/progression of difficulty and selection of the player's or group's mission level/team size selection, careful selection team AT/powerset composition, careful inspiration management (no longer just a tray of reds for brutes/scrappers/blappers/stalkers), and some modicum of planning when approaching mobs of certain daamage types or mobs with CC. I conjecture it would have to follow the same rules as Diablo 3, where : - Hardcore characters interact only with other hardcore characters so that all players are playing with an equal amount of risk - Unlike diablo 3, perhaps the auction houses would be linked to non-hardcore AH to decrease system resource load and have an already seeded market in a "new hardcore world" - Hardcore mode is rewarded for its own type of gameplay (no extra rewards/higher drop rates) Thoughts?

As @Troomentioned brute is best for farming and surviving alpha/stomping level 54 missions. However, /Bio is sub-par for tanking iTrials

Amazing list, thank you. I am actually compiling a list of all IOs as well, for slotting purposes and wanted to build upon your work. Would you mind if I took your file and added to it? If you allow, and if it's possible as well, would you have the file as an excel file? With respect,

How did we discover it?

"Because they don't know better" <--- The OP's SG mate needs to have the agency/desire to learn the better ways of COH inf generation. Nothing replaces the desire to learn. Not a single adult in this world would say that buying 3 meals a day at McDonalds is a good way to efficiently get food/nutrition into your body. We can all use grocery stores, and with a little practice/knowledge/youtube, learn to cook for ourselves. And with the same amount of money spent at McDonalds, we could get 10x as much food, and better nutritional value from our food than McDonald. But nobody calls McDonald's a "trap". If the OP's SG mate has the time to play COH, i'm sure they could also google COH and inf generating. Nothing stops them. Maybe they don't know better? And you're correct that they don't know better. Then ask. If you don't ask, you don't get because you don't know. This ends up being philosophical.

It;'s not a trap. There's a choice. /AH and asking /help being the biggest ones. Even a quick google search for COH and money making gives results.

But, people CAN because the baddest way of spending your merits is buying your IO or recipe, then deleting it. Likely nobody would do that. But really, it's their choice. Separately, and due to my laziness + having enough inf in the game, that I started deleting IOs and purple recipes. Life's got choices. Always. Limiting a "bad" choice via government-controlled sanctions is one way to eliminate 1 very bad choice... but if that was the case...then what prevents the next worst "bad" choice to be also require government elimination? I think the only true answer for the SG mate of the OP is themselves having a spark of curiosity + gusto to actually better their in-game financial situation.

@nzerI respect you man, but the way you say it is... odd. And it ends being a philosophical idea because the solution to your problem is...based on the idea that bad (whatever you define "bad" as) merit sinks should be removed. If I took your entire sentence and replaced "buying ATOs" or "merit sinks" it with the word "groceries", it is my hope that you will see how I understand your statements. In real life, we also make choices about buying groceries or eating already-made food (pay for convenience), but regardless of how bad (however I define the word "bad") the inefficient use of money that it is to eat food at restaurants, people do it anyway. Personally, despite monetary inefficiency, I eat at restaurants because I know that my gf likes it and it will increase my chance of mixing my Staff Mastery with her Dark Armor. Here goes The problem isn't that there are many different ways for people to spend their money [on food], it's that [food choices] all vary wildly in terms of efficiency. The solution to that isn't to remove or add [different ways of buying food], it's to equalize the efficiency of the available [food choices] so that, for example, buying a [Hambuger of McDonald origin] outright doesn't cost three times as [much money] as buying [groceries from the grocery store], [cooking groceries at home], then [having enough burger and patties left over to make 10 McDonald hambugers].

I am also of the camp: Let merits be traded on the AH. It is just my experience though, that whatever can be traded on AH can/(should?) also be vendored, except odd/unique salvage. As someone mentioned, rare salvage sells 5k to vendor and about 500k average AH price, and this price discrepancy between vendor and /AH is apparent across the entire game (and all video games/life examples with a /AH). Instead of guaranteeing a somewhat-lower-but-still-trying-equalize method of income, just allow merits to be sold on the AH and vendored. Then, when the SG mate asks what to do with merits, just say "/ah and sell it there" thus allowing a less-brainer (not no-brainer) of converting merits into inf. At the end of the day, as per many posters, information is always available. But there is no replacement for agency or curiosity. The SG mate has to have the innate curiosity/desire/agency to ask "how can i maximize my merits/time?". Whatever reason prevented him/her from asking before spending his/her merits.... sorry, that's called life (or video game) experience.

Joking aside, I hope you feel better, from 1 internet friend to the other 🙂

A billion? Only? I used to look up to you...