Neiska

Hello Tankers, I would like to get some imput on my next project, a claws tanker. But I have no idea what armor would pair well with it, as I don't really see any synergies to speak of. And I don't have enough game knowledge yet to know what armor set is good for which activity. My only requirement, is I would very much prefer to have a damage aura. As far as what activities, I would say general purporse. I'll run radios with her, AE missions, ITF's, Trials, etc. Might even try my luck at a GM or two. So with that in mind, I think that leaves - Bio-Armor, Dark Armor, Electric Armor, Fiery Aura, and (maybe) Radiation Armor. Here are the Armors, as I understand them with their Pro's and Con's. (But please by all means correct me if I am wrong.) 1. Bio - All around strong set, but is a late bloomer. Relies a bit on recharge, but has +absorb, a lot of regen, stances to suit the situation. I think it has a psi hole, but not 100% sure on that. I have run Bio before, and was happy with it. I am not sure how well it would pair with Claws though. 2. Dark - Another strong contender, but I have never had a high level one and the set does seem very toggle heavy, which leaves me worrying about endurance issues with the speed of the Claws powerset. 3. Electric Armor - I have never played Electric Armor, but it does seem to have some END perks which is nice. But you don't see many Electric Tankers, which makes me wonder if there is a reason for that. Is it a buggy set? Large resistance holes? Or is it something else? 4. Fiery Aura - I have a fire brute already, so this is really my last pick. Not particularly crazy about the set, and I doubt claws would add much to it. 5. Radiation Armor - A very solid set, with a cold instead of psi hole. No damage aura though, but does have a debuff aura, and meltdown would help fill the lack of buildup with claws. If the aura was a damage aura, this would be my pick, based on my limited knowledge. So do any of these pair particularly well with Claws than any of the other sets? Or is there another option I haven't listed here? Thanks bunches in advance.

I think it would be fair to say that people will find both good groups and bad, not just in this game but any multiplayer game these days. If it was so terrible, why stay? If what I was experiencing in a team made me self reflect and not enjoy it to this described degree, I would have left. But that's just me.

My two cents for what its worth ~ 1. People are free to play the game as they like within the design, philosophy, and tools provided. Given that everyone has the same access to all of these things, it can be considered generally "fair" with only time invested and personal tastes accounting for differing favored things. 2. That said however, just as you are free to play your way, so are others. Both people are free to leave, as well as free to start their own groups where they can set the difficulty rating, levels required, and so on. For example, someone "could" make a DFB group where level 50 is required. I am in no way saying this is a good idea, only remarking on that it is possible. 3. Different people will enjoy different things. This is normal, I would say to be expected in fact. And I think its something of a fools errand to try to control or micromanage this. 4. With #3 in mind, some people will like challenging themselves. Or it could be as presented, people looking for a carry. What I disagree with is the presentation that assisting and helping others is somehow a bad thing. No one is "making" or "forcing" anyone to do anything, as everyone is free to leave and form their own group for whichever activity they prefer. If the fully geared, incarnated, and leveled folks leave that +4, I suspect the remainder will have difficulty anyway, and will either have to wait and fill the slots, or lower it to something more in line with their current character advancement. 5. Personally, I have no issues against AE. A friend of mine spends a great deal of her time making her own missions, bosses, and things, just as some people do bases. I use AE myself, most often to farm or powerlevel a new at powers combo I am curious about. But I find the insinuations made that people who use AE require handholding to be of somewhat ill taste, and beneath everyone involved. Just my mere humble opinions.

My wishlist - 1. "Posion" based primaries/secondary's. Like Poison Melee, Poison Blast and so on. I think the closest things we have is Spines and Bio Armor, and neither of those really feel all that posion-ish. Spines is okay, but always felt more physical. Not overly fond of the graphics either. I know there are options which is fantastic, but wish there was a min vfx option for them too. 2. A Melee MM secondary - Just for those days when you want to do something different and fight beside your pets, not stand in back and support them, or spam provoke "tankerminding". 3. A kiss elbow honest to goodness "sniper" set. I dont mean a single sniper power, I mean a ranged set made for extreme damage, extreme range. The sniper powers are fun, but nothing really fits the super-sniper feel I once wanted to go for. My best feel was rifle/devices, but that was kind of blah. 4. I wish they would go over all of the VEATS. The Epic ATs don't feel so epic these days. Widows can be pretty good though. I am not expecting an entire redesign or anything, but a few tweaks here or there might be good. The VEATS are the least played ATs after all. 5. A "bodymorph" set, like the characters Warblade or Venom. Again, I think the closest we have to that is Spines. But that doesn't fit the theme to my mind. I mean a set where you grow a weapon from your fist, or turn your arm into a shield, and so on. Think something like powers from the Prototype game! Just me thinking aloud!

Hello @EnjoyTheJourney! I am no expert by any means, but have run demons/ea and love masterminds. Here is what my humble eyes have spotted - 1. You have hover slotted for slow resist. Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't Faraday's Cage sort of remedy this? So, its kind of a wasted slot, unless I am missing something? 2. One thing you can do is slot for -end. I have never done it myself, but I have heard good things from others who focused on this effect. One person claimed to keep everything entirely locked down and helpless by keeping them END drained. 3. If you are taking them for fun, nothing wrong with corruption and lash. But every guide from the minmaxers say those are largely bad to use. That are two powers you can put somewhere else, as EA is a very busy set as it is, with lots of clicky-spammy powers going on. Here are some options - 3a. You could swap them for Assault + Vengeance, for more damage and another LoTG mule. You have END to burn running /EA, so I always taken all leadership toggles. 3b. Another option if you wanted something different, would be to take 2 flying powers. Group fly is fairly good now, with no -acc penalty, and it keeps your ranged pets out of harms way quite well. Your tanky melee pet will still run in, but your ranged stuff will stay ranged. Its also good for missions like hami raids if thats something you like to do. 4. Another thought is to take superspeed and burnout. Burnout is very good! I used it with my thugs MM for x2 gangwar. With this, you could use it for x2 Hell on Earth to help boost your normally lowish EA damage. That would be another 38% damage buff on something, like a lore pet, and twice as many cinders running around. I never tried it myself but it might be quite good! 5. Lastly, you may want to try swapping Mu's for another epic pool. I suggest trying out bonfire if you have never tried it. It is like CC but with dots built in. Its fairly strong and on a semifast recast. With my robo MM, the fire patches and bonfire line up perfectly, and dropping bonfire on my big robos patches of fire keeps things from running out. You could do this same sort of tactic, just on whatever you are targeting with your Hell on Earth Power perhaps? Anyway, I don't see any glaring holes, so that is good. Just spit balling a few ideas about options and changes to suggest. Hope it helps! Good luck! Happy Masterminding!

Personally I would rank EA as the tankiest set, if not among all sets, certainly among masterminds. You get a heal, absorb, status immunity to pets, a -10 dam AOE and a -20 dam ST (that stack for -30% on a single target), and more. And it pairs very well with demons. You can res cap every pet you have. By that I don't mean just the MM pets, but also the little cinders as well as lore pets. All my stuff was res capped. They never "died", they would time out and despawn. It was "that" though. However, EA is entirely defensive minded, the only offensive buff it gets is like a 10% damage buff, and thats about it, for your pets anyway, You can also get effectively infinate energy with EA, leaving your destiny incarnate slot open for other things instead of ageless, which is also a nice bonus. But if you don like /ea there are other options - Time is a contender as you mentioned, particularly with mace mastery due to power shift shinanagins. Its got strong healing and you can easially hit the defense cap, but the /time doesnt really stand out on anything else. It is solid and relialable though, and Shift makes a good emergency button. I had good results with /thermal too. The buffs stack, you get a few good debuffs too, and a good heal. I consider it a buff set with perks. But my demons/thermal does okay, even on hardest difficulty. I have heard good things about demons/dark, but I never tried it. Not a fan of the reactionary playstyle of /dark, but it is definitely potent! But for my personal vote, so long as you dont mind being "absurdly" tough, I would +1 to EA. My demons/ea was so tough I could go afk on the highest difficulty maps (+4/8), go make myself a sandwitch, a cup of coco, come back, and still be fine. "Thats" how tough it can be. I have MMs far tougher than any tank or brute I have made, and my demons/ea was my toughest. But my Robot/EA isn't far behind. Hope this helps!

I take group fly with my Robot/EA MM, and its absurdly good. When alone I always have it on, but I turn it off when with others, because they are rarely built for flying combat. For an entire ranged setup, you can nearly go AFK if the mobs dont have any ranged attacks or -fly powers. And all the robots are also ranged, so they never really swoop in to melee. The assault bot flys in close for the flamethrower, but that's it. But yea, for Solo play, on a ranged build, its fantastic.

I would just like to say that I have done this dance before in other games. And while many valid points are made, the one thing I would like to add to the conversation based on experience is this - All too often, when you try to "nerf" the powerbuilds, or things that are only op in certain circumstances or setups, you might also make the weaker setups/builds, weaker. For an example, let us say the "fix" was changing damge procs. Certainly, that puts a dent into some build setups that use them as a sort of "icing on the cake", but what about builds that rely on damage procs to do any meaningful damage, such as some MM, Controller, or Dominator setups. Sure, nerfing the damage procs reduced the effective power of the powerbuild, but I would argue that such a fix impacted the other setups more, the ones who aren't over the top OP, and in fact, weaker. (note I only use this example for context. I am not suggesting this change etc.) So if those in the Theorycrafting would do me a small favor and consider an actual changes effect not just on the "redline" top end 600m inf build, but also the super causal "training wheels" someones-first-50 sort of setup as well. Because some changes might have unforseen consiquences or impacts on those builds/setups/playstyles that many would consider need propping up, not to be made weaker. I've seen it happen before in other games, both small and private ones as well as MMOs. And I do respect all viewpoints here, and the passion. It shows people actualy do care, which is wonderful to see. That said I would urge caution and do the actual math and theory-testing to any change across as many different types/builds/playstyles as possible, before labeling something as a "fix all" to balance issues.

Well, wouldnt it be a simpler thing to run teams with self imposed handicaps? Fewer people? No heals or support? No taunter? And so on?

A lot of this still reads to me as - "I don't like to solo hardest difficulty, so others shouldn't be able to either." or "We need to balance things around X, Y, and Z. But A, B, and C things don't count." As if disregarding a section of the community when making/suggestions could in any way be truly considered "balancing". And regardless of context I will never support policing other peoples gameplay. Personally, its being able to solo hard content, that keeps me and many like me around. Take that away, and I can guarantee you the community will lose people. And I honestly question where this "people soloing hard content are bad" train of thought came from. Is it people not being able to fill teams? People unhappy with some team members they get? (Strong builds going too fast for player#2546), is it some people trying to nerf farming/AEs?(again) From my seat, the same tools and methods are available to everyone equally. I don't think its a good thing to take some of them away. And not everyone is going to like/enjoy playing the game as someone else does. Try to overly moderate/nerf people into a specific play-style will do more harm than good to the community. Just saying. A lot of people enjoy soloing as well as teaming. And if some of these changes come to pass, personally I would feel my desire to play lessen. I wouldn't "team" more, I would contemplate uninstalling, and I am pretty certain I wouldn't be the only one.

Out of curiosity, what effect would this have on say, shenanigans like 2 players on a team taking turns popping a t4 barrier? We would be right back to square one, no? "Teams too powerful"?

@RudedawgCDN Hello OP! I have never played /nature myself, but I have heard some good things. Here are a few tips that I can offer - 1. Ensure you have all pet aura IO's slotted. 2. Personally I have found that no matter what primary/seconday MM I have gone with, Juggling both Barrier and Support incarnates go a long way for beefing up you and your pets. You pop barrier, then when that wears off, swap to the other. Support Core is more damage/accuracy/defense, but the defense certainly helps. 3. For lore pets, personally I would recommend either Longbow for the super -regen debuff they have. But if its survivability, you may want to look at Knives of Vengeance Radial. None of the lore pets have any outstanding heal that will save you to any great extent, but the Knives has a 20% hit/30% damage buff, and a Regen/Recovery buff. But if you want something 100% defense, Robotic Drones radial comes with a 200 point single target heal and a 5% all defense buff. 4. I am not sure how experienced you are, but a big part of being tough as a MM is taking full advantage of Bodyguard mode. 5. Make sure you have all the restricted IOs, such as Shield Wall teleport/3%, Gladiator TP/3% protection, Steadfast Protection 3%, Unbreakable Guard +hps. Honestly the biggest one will be the juggling Barrier and Support. Though I have seen/heard people adding Rune of Protection into the mix as well for stronger personal defenses. Hope this helps!

@Bill Z Bubba - Mhm, I am aware of the tank buffs. I have a EM/Bio and a Rad/Bio tanker myself. Tanker damage isnt as bad as it used to be, which i say is a great thing. But they still arent a scrapper/stalker/blaster level of damage. And yes, they can steamroll content. But I wouldn't say thats a bad thing. I can steamroll content on my MM too. The only differences is time and attention required really. But I mean, what is the alternative? We could go back to the time when people were screaming for tanks and no one played them. Or when not many played them and most just played brutes instead. I would say what we have now is the better option. And yes, Brutes and Tanks can both do damage now. But I still think where they shine is they have taunt auras. They don't even have to really focus in order to keep things off of others, like the healers, the CC, the support. I mean, we could take a look at Wow where they have 2 hour wait times for a tank to be willing to cue. I wouldn't consider that the superior choice.

@Brutal Justice - Alright, I propose a thought experiment here. Problem: Some builds are simply "too good" on teams that make you "personally" feel that your contributions arent impactful. Well, lets analyze and dive into that a little bit shall we? 1. Team types - You have ITFs, Radio Missions, PI missions, Farming missions, story arc missions. 1a. ITFs - I would argue this type is one where everyone has to be focused and on top of their game, at least in conception. Strong characters would be expected I should think. 1b. Radio Missions - Just an average group of random people running random missions in any given area. I would expect a strong build to be "hosting", as this is often a tool used to help random people find groups. (not always hosted by a fully slotted 50, but they often are.) For Radio/PI missions, I would think its on "you" to clarify what kind of team it is upon joining. If its a "powerlevel" team, or if its a "chill and have a good time" sort of team. 1c. Farming/Powerleveling missions - It shouldn't even bare mentioning, a 50 would be hosting this. Door sitters aren't always present but are there often. 1d. Story Missions - For this activity, I would say its up to the orginizer to decide to allow someone or not. So if thats you, you should say beforehand "Hey, were just average running." 2. Group makeup - This part could entail a full lengthy discussion in its own topic. But the TLDR here I think is that in a team of 8 with 14 different AT's, the standard expectation is going to vary, widely. Some teams will faceroll even if 5 members are fully AFK, others may struggle. Others might be completely out of left field, like a full team of 8 MMs or VEATS. But my main point here is it is stastically impossible to balance a game with so many variables with so many different possible group combinations, much less 14 different ATs with over 50 powersets, offering a dizzying amount of possible builds and combinations. And on top of that, you also have to take the "Activity/team" type into account. 3. "What am I doing to contribute?" Well, that depends entirely on the AT in question. 3a. Tankers/Brutes - You hold threat. Your job isn't to do damage, but you can kill things yourself, if given time. 3b. Stalkers/Scrappers/Blasters/Corruptors - You bring the pain. Some of you are tough in a pinch, but you are no tanker. 3c. Masterminds/Sentinels/Defenders - You bring the support. That could mean super strong buffs, or debuffs. Healing, or helping CC. All kinds of benefits could be added here. 3d. Controllers/Dominators - You bring the CC and support, but its often "unfelt" support, sleeps, holds, and so on. But some controllers/dominators are near immortal. 3e. VEATs - Your mere presence can add huge bonuses to a teams defense, accuracy, and damage. Some VEATs are AOE and debuffer specalists, others are Single target DPS. Some have quasi-pets to help, others are die hard assisins. 3f. Warshades/Peacebringers - Really a mixed bag. You can change stances and perform a different function if a team requires it. 4. Which brings me to my next question, "Who feels as if they arent contributing?" 4a. Tankers/Brutes - Bummed you arent doing damage? Well, thats not your role or function. You are there to keep pressure off everyone else as much as possible, doing what damage you can in the process. More than one threat holder in the group? Well, maybe ask to split pull, as in each of you pull your own group and wrangle them for the rest of the team. It's sort of win-win for everyone. 4b. Stalkers/Scrappers/Blasters/Corruptors - Not doing enough damage? Someone else beating you to the punch? Well, your team might be super heavy with the DPS then. Are you dieing often? Well, you may need to stick closer to the tank or support, if they are present. 4c. Masterminds/Sentinels/Defenders - No one needs heals? Well, not everyone will, and I wouldnt expect everyone to. That depends on the team makeup and everyones builds, as well as the team, the activity, as well as the enemies. If you find yourself not needing to buff/debuff/heal/support, I would kick back, relax, and enjoy trying to DPS for a change. Maybe this team just doesn't need what you bring to the table right now. It happens. So mabye enjoy being able to do something else, or if it truely botheres you so much, mabye this specific team just doesnt need you, and you can leave to find another, or even make your own. Or suggest higher/different content or activites. 4d. Controllers/Dominators - Stuff dieing too fast to bother CCing, Debuffing, and so on? Well, it happens. Mabye you can try a different angle, pre-CCing before things get aggroed, or mabye helping the team by bringing enemies to the group? Scouting? Look for the glowie? You are still a "present" body able to help, even if the team doesnt need your specality in combat right now. 4e. VEATs - Things dieing fast? Feel like the weak link? I wouldn't worry. Your team buffs are among the best buffs in the game. You just being there is making "everyone" better, and many VEATs have built in debuffs in with their attacks. So your normal attack chain is helping, when other classes such as controllers or masterminds have to "focus" on debuffing, you do it normally with each suppression, each venom grendade, each psycic wail, and so on. 4f. Warshades/Peacebringers - The team has a tank? Doesnt need your dwarf form? Or your powerups/debuffs? Well, more dps is usually a good thing, so you can always go space-squid form and pewpew away. Still not feeling important? Well, like the other support classes you are still a present body and an extra pair of eyes. You can bring spawns to the group, act as a scout, look for that glowie, or find that boss that needs bashed. 5. Combat values is not the only way to contribute to a team. 5a. This could be just my way of thinking, but when I team with someone, I don't just see them as their class. They are another person. Either they can stick with me to help in combat, or we can split up to finish even faster if we are capable of it. Or they can look for that last annoying mission clicky we missed, or even help in other ways, such as if they played this mission/story/arc/ITF before, and I have not. If its a boss I havent fought before, I may rely on their experience. Or if we are trying for a badge, I may require their knowldge for any tips or tricks on getting it. Players are more than whatever AT they happen to be logged in at the time. 5b. Along with that though, is I pay attention to how players conduct themselves. If someone is rude, unpleasant to play with, or for whatever reason I find them unlikeable to be around, then I won't want to team with them again. I don't care how massively OP their AT is, how much they spent, what their Vet level is, or what they have to say about the mission. If they are a butthead, then they are a butthead, and I will find the experience unpleasant, and wont wish to repeat it, no matter how much inf/exp I got, how many merits, and so on. (I hasten to add this is not normal in CoH, at least not for me. The vast majority, such as 99.5% of people, have been pleasent to play with. For me, it is "rare" to be teamed with someone being such a butthead I don't wish to team with them again. But it "does" happen.) 5c. But I have no objection to someone playing a weaker/new build, if they are pleasnt and fun to be around. Even if they don't even talk much, or are newer than me at the game. Both are totes fine. I would rather team with a pleasent/nice/fun/new player with a weak/sub-optiomal build, then someone unpleasant with a super strong character. But that's just me. But this is getting on longer than I intended. My point here is, @Brutal Justice, there is far greater and more group dynamics here at work, as well as personal playstyles/choices that affect how well or how bad a team performs. If you feel as if you arent contributing, I would argue that means everyone else is on top of their game. If that bothers you to such an extent, there are several actions that you yourself can do. 6. You can purporsefully make "weaker" teams, teams with no aggro-anchor, or no healer, or no DPS. 6a. You can take fewer people. Say to heck with the odds. We are gonna run that mission with only 4 people. No healer you say? Well that should make it interesting. 6b. You can leave the team if you dont feel like you are a part of it, and start your own. 6c. Problems finding teams you say? Well, perhaps you could start your own supergroup, forum guild, discord channel. Find others who are like minded and get organized. You might be pleasently suprised. 6d. You could even make a minigame out of it. The team doesnt need you? You could say in party "Look I dont feel as if my actions matter, So I will now be using brawl, apprentice charm, kick, punch, and nemeisis staff as my attacks. I am now the dreaded "escort npc" of the mission." Or whatever you can think up. Have some fun with it! In closing I can almost gurantee you that there will be situations not only in this game, but many, many others where you feel this way. And nothing the devs and programmers, will ever make it 100% kiss your elbow balanced/even/fair under every possible situation and dynamic in play. But I think I have rambled on enough. But I still stand by my previous statements that your suggestion of a 5% defense nerf to everyone but tanks and brutes would be conductive to your situation, and might likely do more harm than good, not to just players, soloists, teamers, but to multiple powersets across multiple ATs as well. They already have different hitpoints and resistances, I don't think setting a penalty to defense will be a solution to anything. All comments are respectfully given, and are in no way meant to offend. I do hope this at least provokes some thoughtful musings.

@Brutal Justice - strong words from the person who posted "nerf defenses" and then said "soloists be fine". When my fears are not for myself, its for people who want to solo but are stuggling, because I assure you, they are out there. I have friends among them. Just saying, trying to force players to do things they dont want to do, wont suddenly find yourself knee deep in teams, but more occassional teamers such as myself or 100% pure soloists leave the game, leaving you with less people to play with.

@golstat2003 Honestly? Some of the stuff being thrown around here in this thread makes me want to team even less. Not a huge fan of the "you will team and like it" or "i want teams to do anything but what they are already doing" points. At this point I am wondering how much of this is really about trying to get more people to team, and not about making someone who likes teaming to feel like the MVP anytime they feel like it, because I don't really see how any of this is "fostering community" and so on.

Still feel people are missing context or seem to forget that different players enjoy different ways of spending their time on the game. It's an MMO. Its not a "team focused" game. Its a game that has teaming content and features. And personally the moment I am penalized for playing solo on my own schedule doing for what I want to do, for playing how I want to play, is the day I uninstall. Because spoiler alert, some people play the game for their own enjoyment, which does not always include teaming with other people. If I "want" to, then I will. But I won't be bribed/cocered/browbeaten into doing it if I don't want to. And I would like to point out from where I sit, those people who are on the "we need to fix the teaming game" side of things, well why not just take 1 or 2 less people? Poof. Problem solved. And not all builds who can solo 4/8 are absurdly OP over 9000 damage type of builds either. Personally my favorite character is my robot/ea MM. She solos the hardest content just fine, and I don't think anyone in their right mind would accuse her of having too much dps or being too powerful. And teams have always felt all too happy to have endless END, +absorb, and status protection when I am around. If people were serious about balance, personally I would take a long hard look at buffs/debuffs/dps/cc values. And personally I would love an indepth explination of how the solo people are a problem/difficulty for the team game. Just how precisely is my Robot/EA MM "dangerous" to your team interactions? My damage is only so-so, I have little CC to speak of (only bonfire), and sure, I "could" run off and probially solo an entire spawn if I wanted to, but it would take forever, and wouldn't be helpful to the team at all. Honestly, this entire thread is turning into a "I want people to play MY way" discussion. We have everything from "soloists are too good" to "lets try to encourage people to team more" to "nerf defense" to "higher difficulty shouldnt give more money." How is any of this game balance? Since when "did only teams" matter?

Not sure if its against forum policy/rules to refer to another game, but I would like to refer to D3 if I may, for context. The gap between its solo play, and team play, is massive. It's not even in the same country the amount of drops/exp teams get, vs what a solo player gets. And I really do not think that is what we should want here. (note: I don't think anyone has pushed for this sort of dynamic, I only bring it up for argument's sake.) There is such a thing as "artificially" rewarding teaming "too much", to the extent that solo play is a joke and such players can feel ignored, and it quickly turns into a game of the "have's" and the "have not's", when someone is 1000+ paragon levels ahead of you, just for being on a team, when they played less time.

@Brutal Justice - So on the same hand, you are saying you want to slow down the powerful people, when your proposed change would hurt the weakest people the most? If most the player base is casual as you said, I would argue they would be most affected by the -5% defenses, particularly if they don't plan for things like -hit powers. What about the "casual solo player"? They wouldn't feel any -5% defense on their baby blaster with training wheels? I would argue they would need the most help, not the most penalty. And I agree with @Bill Z Bubba, putting a 5% handicap penalty on all non-tankers/brutes just but the hurt on several powersets, like Shield Defense, whose only source of survivability/durability are positional defenses. You are right, power builds likely wouldn't feel much from the 5% change. Those who would are the casuals, the soloists, and the defense focused builds. So you say you want to feel "meaningful" on a team, but you want to make everyone on the team, weaker? From what viewpoint do you state this? As a tanker? As a healer? As a buffer? Who is this change supposed to help? The people you want to affect (the strong builds) wouldn't be, and the people who want to contribute and matter (weaker builds) would be? As I mentioned, tanks/brutes already have higher resistance caps than most, generally speaking. You have oddballs like SoA's who resistance caps are 85%, but generally speaking tanks/brutes have more. So... yea. Am confused here as to the point of the change, aside from making the weak builds, weaker, and to make things harder on solo players, as Teams likely wouldn't even notice.

@Brutal Justice - Alright, I would like to do a thought experiment then. For arguments sake, lets say your proposed change came to pass. Now, personally if I wanted to solo on any particular AT that had a penalty to defense (when tankers and brutes already have higher res caps), I would look into other options such as juggling Rune of Protection and Barrier, instead of focusing on defenses, because that would likely be a moot point. And you already said, solo-players would already feel the brunt of the change, but large teams wouldn't likely notice, as there is also a good chance of excessive +def buffs such as maneuvers already running to make up any shortfalls, and there is likely to be a tanker on the team. So the only real difference it would make, would be the solo players, when I would say there are already more AT's that cant solo on hardest difficulty than can, at least efficiently. So in this example, I am wondering what the overall goal is, to nerf solo players or to try and artificially encourage/coerce people to team more, and solo less? Neither of which is a good thing in my book. A game shouldn't "punish" a player for playing X way, particularly when its not written anywhere this is a team focused game. This isn't Everquest. (and thank god for that.)

It really varies on what difficulty you imagine I solo at. Some builds can solo at 40% certainly. Others? Not so much. While even more others solo just fine with even less than 40%. Mere defense is not the end-all-be-all. And, actually, yes. I do think solo players can sustain an online game. There are many examples of this already. And no, I don't think that LFG or teams is the only thing that matters. Please don't think I am at odds with you, I just think your suggestion would do more harm than good. To what benefit would everyone who isn't a tank or brute get from having a lower defense, when many of those builds already have a rough time as it is in the solo game? And I would argue that on teams, if you had a brute or tanker, everyone else having lower defenses wouldn't matter, since they are taking most of the attention anyway. So I don't see how lowering everyone else's defenses would encourage party play, and would only make some weak builds overall weaker.

I play more solo than I do on teams. If I team, then I do so on my own terms and desire. If I want to run public PI missions to help people, then I will. If I want to run ITFs then I will. If I want to run Story Arcs, then I shall. But I also spend most of my playtime playing alone, in any particular activity that I feel the urge to do. People do play solo in MMO's. If you don't feel like you are contributing to the team, then that's a personal question or possibly a question of team makeup. I don't think that's really a valid reason to nerf an entire section of the community/game, just to artificially prop up some other ATs or playstyles, when those shine in their own way already. And regardless, I think you might forget that some ATs/Builds that perform wonderfully on teams, don't perform so well when solo, and vice-versa.

Alright, and I have to disagree strongly then. If you only play for the challenge, as you claim, then what do you care how much you or anyone else makes on any particular difficulty? If you would get the same amount, either way, why does it matter to you if others get more for their efforts? I certainly do seek to challenge myself. But I also expect fair rewards for my efforts, for effort, time involved, and the investment required to get to that point in difficulty. And no, I also disagree its "hairsplitting" unless you only apply this specifically to solo play. For group play, its a much different matter. What if I want to farm? What if I want to help a friend with money and exp? What if I want to design my own adventure in AE? Context matters here. From my perspective, what you call a win-win I consider a loose-loose. I strongly suspect more people would dislike your suggestion than like it, moreover once they get to 50, it would be tantamount to "well now what?". So congrats, you just killed endgame replay-ability for a good section of the community. For many players, endgame farming "is" our game. Playing the market "is" our game. Making, leveling, fully gearing up, and meticulously planning alts "is" our game. Your suggestion would pretty much invalidate the entire market as far as making/leveling/gearing alts are concerned. If it wasn't for the systems in place that support making alts, I would likely have moved onto another game by now. What I find disturbing however, is this idea that rewarding players more for harder challenges, is somehow "bad." And I respectfully, but strongly disagree the idea that higher efforts do not deserve higher rewards.

A fair point, I did not consider that. So how about a compromise, say an enable option? That way it would be up to inviduals choice if they desired to play in such a manner or not? I do concede your point, looking at (achem) other gaming communities. But for solo play only? I see why it couldnt be an option for those that wish to experience such.

Honest question, Why increase rewards only by "number" and not "level" of enemies? I mean, lets have a thought experement. For arguements sake, lets say all enemies gave the same amount of inf/exp, regardless if it was -1, +0, 1, 2, 3, or 4, and that only increasing the how many modifer would grant additonal rewards. If that was the case, why would anyone want or even desire to run +4? Personally, I probially wouldn't care to. The difference here, is that "you" can lower your encounter level and spawn amount, and get those rewards. Lowering the rewards for higher difficulty only "punishes" others who do so. So why try to inject and "force" an artifical standard that people already have access to if they wish? Why "browbeat" them into sub-standardization? And why not lift the aggro cap? I mean, if a tanker wants to aggro an entire map playing solo and have that epic 1 man army moment, why shouldn't he? Again, I have no desire to offend or argue, I am genuinely curious as to the logic or context of your statement.