[Freakshow not Fighting PPD in " Get the PPD files in Independence Port!" mission in Leonard Arc]

On 3/13/2023 at 8:21 PM, The Caretaker said:

I've isolated the problem and as usual, it's a dumb one.

 

This is the kind of stuff it would be fun to have details on.

[Wolverine?]

On 2/24/2023 at 5:37 AM, Scarlet Shocker said:

WTF is he doing to that poor duck?!?!?! 

 

He is angry at the killing of the duck by the hunters.  The Badger is kind of like Doctor Dolittle, a friend of the animals who can communicate with them.  Except he knows martial arts and is crazy (literally).

[Is it just me or....]

On 2/24/2023 at 9:13 PM, Black Space said:

Am I off base here?

 

If so I am too.  I've been thinking the same thing.  But then I mostly see them in LFG looking for farms.  I don't remember Fire/Kins advertising for farms much in the past, seems like it was mostly just hitters.

[Why so long for game evolvement?]

3 hours ago, nihilii said:

I get the temptation to try different private servers but I always stop short because there's so many hoops to jump.

 

I'm on Linux which makes it more difficult.  I thought I'd try one of the others out recently but for no reason I could discern it won't run for me.  I posted on their forums and got no response.  So that's that I guess.

[Why so long for game evolvement?]

4 hours ago, Bionic_Flea said:

But I would still bet that our evolution of New Powers, TFs, Story Arcs, Base Stuff, etc. are equal to if not better than any other server.

 

I can't say, that may be true overall.  Depending on what you're after though other servers may indeed have more.  Check the patch notes for Rebirth.  If costumes are your thing they have done way more.

[Question about mission entrance location]

The door is inside a building.  The interiors of buildings are typically placed below the map.  That mission is bugged in that it doesn't give you a way point to the building door as it should, instead pointing directly to the mission door underground.  However the building interiors are usually placed directly under the buildings they belong to, so you can use the way point as a guide.  Look for buildings on the map nearby and try their doors.  I think the one in question here is actually a building entrance at the rear of the building.

 

I tend to just use the mission teleporter temp power from the P2W vendor to save the trouble, but it can be found without if you take the time.

[Cones...what's wrong with them?]

On 2/6/2023 at 5:13 AM, tidge said:

My 'solution' was to slot the shorter range cones for Range

 

Then your TT will be crazy wide at the end, but NF will still be narrow and hard to hit many enemies with, at least in my experience.  Going off of memory NF is a 20 degree cone with an 80 foot range.  Even at the end of the range it's not that wide.  Maybe fine if you have a tank gathering all the enemies into a tight clump, but otherwise in my experience it won't catch them all.  TT is fine but NF is the problem in that set for me.

[Cones...what's wrong with them?]

On 2/5/2023 at 10:59 PM, ForeverLaxx said:

My only issue with Cones is the Dark Blast set.

 

This is what I was thinking as I read through this thread.  I've never understood the cone hate but Dark Blast is just really poorly designed in that regard.

[Cones, arcs of Fury....and Regret]

On 1/15/2023 at 8:04 AM, srmalloy said:

...then your target moves before you finish activating the power and isn't in the cone to be affected.

 

People with reliable, consistent, and fast internet connections may not know what the game experience is like for those without such a connection.  "The mob was right in front of me!  How could I have missed?"

 

The only advantage I can see from a game mechanics perspective to not needing a target for a cone is that sometimes there isn't a mob dead-center in the back to target with it.  Not needing a target would mean that I could align the cone exactly how I want.  The downside is that I would lose the ability to be sure I gauged my cone size correctly by targeting a mob in the back.  Maybe a wash.

 

For melee cones though it's a lot easier to misjudge, and mobs are constantly shifting around in melee range to try to get closer, so queuing up such an attack would probably mean not-infrequent misses.  The only melee cone that doesn't require a target I'm aware of is the one in Dominator Martial Assault.  Pre-HC it used to get bonus damage, which I'm guessing was intentional to compensate for the higher chance of missing.  It requires more skill, so playing it well pays off.  However HC devs decided it was unbalanced so they "fixed" it.

[I found a combo I like but have to take a power I don't want to take]

On 1/6/2023 at 4:12 PM, DougGraves said:

Are there any combos you play where you have to take a power that you would rather skip?

 

I'm not sure this is exactly what you mean but for me the first thing that came to mind was the need to take Tactics if I have a snipe.  Since fast-snipe damage is tied to tohit, if I don't want my snipe to be an endurance expensive, long-recharging meh damage attack, I need to run Tactics and slot a Kismet +tohit to bring that damage up.

 

Tactics is a tier-2 power in the Leadership pool, so I need to take a prerequisite as well.  Of course I can take Maneuvers which is a perfectly fine LotG mule, but still that's 1 power pool and 2 power picks I'm locked into just to make my snipe decent.  There is no other power or class of power in the game that has that sort of requirement to get full functionality out of it.

 

I've had a number of builds I just couldn't make work because I ran up against the limit of 4 power pools and was forced (yes I know not literally) to take Leadership.  Every time I'm planning a build with a snipe I miss the OG game devs.  I'm not trying to slag off our current devs, they've done a lot of great work.  Tying fast-snipe availability to tohit levels was an experiment at the time of shut down.  I strongly believe the original devs would have recognized that it wasn't such a good idea and gone back to the drawing board and came up with something better.

[Those special free enhancements which proc for damage - do you use them?]

16 hours ago, Snarky said:

up until the proc blows out at 22 they are F-ing gold.  After that they are valuable in that they are dual Rech/Dam Enhancers of SO value. 

 

This.  Especially because regular or attuned IOs have low values at low levels, but those special enhancements have values equivalent to being some level in your early 20s, which you can't get anywhere else at low levels.  Add in the extra procs and there's nothing better you could put in an attack at low levels.  Once you hit 22 and they stop proccing, and regular IOs are providing equivalent values then they can go.

 

The only other way to get those kinds of enhancement values at low levels is from SOs, but those special enhancements don't go red on you when you level up, which you do a lot at low levels.  So I don't tend to bother with SOs, I just use those prestige enhancements and enjoy the power they provide.

[What pairs well with storm summoning and what AT(s) best leverage its abilities?]

I was never a fan of the fear effect from Lightning Storm causing mobs to run for the hills, so I like to pair the set with something with an immobilize.

[Dark Dark lowbie]

It might not be the most efficient tactic but when the mobs in a room were situated properly I liked corner-pulling with Darkest Night.  I'd put the anchor on a mob towards the back, so that group would run past another group and the debuff would aggro them as well.  Run around a corner and drop Tar Patch as they were approaching.  Give them a chance to bunch up, then pop out around the corner and start blasting.

[MAJOUR Sound overall from a Film/FX producer...but...]

There is a spreadsheet with the info you need but for some reason I can't seem to find it.  Hopefully someone else has a link and can provide it.  If not I'll do some more digging.

[Sharkhead linked mission badge of whatever????]

On 1/7/2023 at 6:38 PM, Snarky said:

Connected Badge achieved. 

 

You might want to check the wiki for that contact.  There are a number of badges that are easy to miss if you don't know about them throughout his arcs.  Like in the one where you set bombs in Faultline, you want to do those first.  For a long time I let them wait until last until I finally found out there's a badge for that.

[Make Dominators worth playing before Perma Dom.]

I'm not going to comment on specific suggestions for changes.  I'm pretty sure I've done that in other threads on the subject.  I'll just reiterate my overall feelings about Doms.

They're fun, but feel very squishy on high-level teams, even with perma-dom.  Too much attention from uncontrolled mobs gets dangerous fast.  They really need a heal, which is why I tend to prefer the very few powersets that provide some form of HP recovery.

 

But without perma-dom?  With those low hitpoints and my epic armor shut off by any mez, that's all it takes.  A single mez and I'm likely done.  For me perma-dom is required for high-level team play.

 

I am able to enjoy solo play while leveling without perma-dom, but wow is there a night-and-day difference between the leveling build and the perma-dom one I spec into after hitting 50.  I don't usually PL but the few times I have I think it's been all or mostly Doms.  Sometimes I just don't have the patience or desire to play one character while leveling even knowing that it will become a different one after hitting 50.  Might as well just rush to 50 and play the character I really want.

 

I like the way my Doms play despite them feeling more fragile than most of my other characters.  So I wouldn't want to make any big changes to them.  If I could do one thing it would be to narrow the gap between the leveling Dom feel and the end-game Dom feel.

[Shadow Maul/Flurry. Maybe Mu.]

3 minutes ago, kelika2 said:

blaster's darkness manipulation

 

Ah that's the problem then.  Looks like Blasters didn't get the love.

 

Quote

Shadow Maul (Tanker, Scrapper, Brute, Stalker) 

 

So I will gladly sign your petition.  Let's catch Blasters up.

[Shadow Maul/Flurry. Maybe Mu.]

This was done for Shadow Maul back in 2020.

Quote

Cast Time reduced from 3.07 to 2.35 seconds

 

[Replace the Snake Missions Redside]

On 1/4/2023 at 12:11 PM, Rudra said:

a recent thread saying to bring back the Snakes because they are nowhere.

 

I was going to comment on this.  The most annoying mission in that level range for me is the one from Mongoose that has me hunting snakes outdoors.  They're hard to find.  I have a circuit I run, I know a spot or two where occasionally one or more might spawn, so I run back and forth hoping, and eventually get it done, but yeah we could use another spawn point or two.

 

On 1/4/2023 at 12:11 PM, Rudra said:

Burke has 1 mission where he sends you after the Snakes. Kalinda has 1 or 2.

 

4 of 6 of Kalinda's missions are just snakes.  2 of 6 of Burke's missions (but 2 of 3 if you just do his arc) are full of snakes, one of which is a defeat-all on a good-sized map.

 

 

On 1/4/2023 at 10:59 AM, Psyonico said:

Red Side got a series of arcs that has you taking back Mercy from longbow. 

 

Yeah this.  There's enough new content that you can easily level to 5 using it without ever seeing a single snake.  From there you can move to Port Oakes if you want.

[Would nudging the winter event's duration be an option?]

I was away from home (and the game) for most of December and was sad to have mostly missed the winter event this year.

[Anybody use Multiple Builds on 1 Character?]

On 8/22/2022 at 1:44 PM, VV said:

you can only change at a trainer

 

/selectbuild 2

[Corruptors vs Blasters]

On 11/20/2022 at 12:24 AM, Snarky said:

I was wondering all day long if the Rad with its inefficient DoT Snipe ( but so cool looking!) was actually better on a Corruptor 

 

I'm late getting back to this thread.  Blasters get the best version of Rad Blast by far IMO.  Corrs and Defs get the low-recharge versions of the tier 1 and tier 2 blasts, which means they have garbage DPSA.  Since you generally need at least one of them to have a solid attack chain, Rad Blast is pretty low damage on those ATs.  Of course the set isn't helped by slow animations almost everywhere, but that just makes it worse.  I'll only play it on a Blaster.

 

As for the snipe, why is it inefficient?  That's one of my favorite snipes.  It's so great that it does -def and is also DoT.  If I put an Achilles' Heel -res proc in it, three of the four damage ticks will benefit from the proc when it goes off.  When using the slow snipe the proc fires more often than not, which means I get bonus damage from the snipe as well as subsequent attacks.  Just what I want in an opener.

[How are we slotting Thunder Strike from /Elec?]

On 11/14/2022 at 7:58 PM, twozerofoxtrot said:

Are we looking at two differing proc calculations based on the single target power and another based on the created AoE entity?

 

I believe so, although I can't remember off the top of my head how to do that calculation (@Bopper?)  CoD shows the pet having a 6-second recharge but I'm not sure if that's a factor here.  My guess would be that you get a low proc rate in the AoE.  That along with the low damage of the AoE component, along with the lack of solid AoE anywhere else in the set, is what has always kept me from playing it.

[Corruptors vs Blasters]

I have plenty of Blasters and Corruptors.  The Blasters tend to get a bit boring after a while.  Corruptors have more to do.  The biggest difference for me in solo play is the "Blast through mez" from the new Defiance.  I couldn't hope to count how many times that has saved me.  It's great to have some way to act to save myself if I don't happen to have a Break-Free on hand, as opposed to just impotently watching myself get defeated.

 

In theory a D3 Corruptor should be able to debuff tohit enough to have a kind of ghetto mez protection, but for me in practice it doesn't tend to work out.  Plenty of mobs will open with a mez, so if your opener doesn't debuff them enough to make their mez miss, it could be game over for you.  Dark Miasma is really not helped in this regard by all of its long animations, making it slow to apply those debuffs and heals.  Of course once you get the Dark Servant a lot of that gets eased as it's a great debuffer and distraction.

 

I don't know how much of an issue mez is for you, so maybe none of that matters.  I don't play Dark Miasma anymore personally.  I tend to play secondaries that either provide mez protection or at least some defense that doesn't get shut down when mezzed.  There aren't a whole lot that fit that bill, which is the only thing that limits my stable of Corruptors.

[Mission door in Faultline opens onto the wall.]

[1551.8 -158.0 1776.4]

 

Door opens to reveal...the wall.  No opening.