Luminara

Fantastic idea. @Jimmy, do me a solid and disable all toggle/click status protections for a week, would you, dear? Nothing would go further toward highlighting the problems with status effects than this. Make everyone equal by making everyone a squishie. Critters can move in Co*. They're not leashed to a specific point on the floor where they spawn. Little fuckers spend enough time running all over the map when you start to deal some damage to them, so I can say with a high degree of certainty that they can walk over to your melee character. For which they're taxed, paying in animation time. There isn't a single control, soft control or debuff in the entire game which doesn't have an animation time attached. The squishie pays by spending time on every single critter he/she wants to control or debuff. Then the squishie pays again with drastically lower damage scalars. We're playing at a gross disadvantage in damage output because we're "force multipliers". This ignores that all sets don't have force multiplier powers like -Res, or great defensive powers like +Def/-ToHit, it's just universally applied. And pays a third time with drastically lower HP and "force multiplier" buffs which only affect teammates, controls and debuffs with hit checks (ever wonder why i adored TA for so long? no fucking around with hit checks on key powers). What, exactly, is the tax on status protection? Something on the order of 0.26 endurance per second? What? No dodge animations interrupting your attack chain? No damage debuff applied to reduce your damage output as compensation for having always-on status protection? No HP debuff? No reduction in Resistance or Defense? Nothing but that little toggle cost? You needing to close to melee range in order to use your powers doesn't mean the same thing doesn't happen to squishies. All controls, debuffs and ranged attacks aren't set to 80' in this game, and all squishie primaries/secondaries don't come with built-in Stealth options. Squishies are mezzed before they can act in exactly the same manner you're trying to portray melee being affected if they didn't have status protection. You know what the real difference is? Squishies don't have status protection, so they actually do go through this scenario. Seen, mezzed, fucked. There is no range limitation on that, or bonus lube for having a ranged set. Story time! This one goes way, way back. My first 50, The Black Whip, an Invulnerability/Super Strength tanker, was bopping around the Rikti Crash Site. Out of nowhere, I hear the sound of toggles dropping. I'm looking around and I see a blue light. Sapper hit her with his sappy beam, drained all of her endurance and shut down everything in a split second. That sapper then proceeded to poke her with his sappy beam gun... for twenty minutes. Twenty minutes. 20. T W E N T Y. It took that long for the miserable little twat nozzle to defeat her. All it did was poke her, keep reapplying that mez and dealing a small amount of damage. Every time I thought the mez was done and started to move away, it poked her again. I was sobbing by the time Whip collapsed and I could revive at the hospital. Bawling. Snot running down my lips, the whole deal, it was disgusting. It was the worst experience I've ever had in this game. In any game. Shortly after that, Cryptic toned down mez on critters. It's something that can't happen to melee characters now, at least not the way that happened. The mez won't last long enough to prevent one from turning a status protection toggle back on... and if the mez was what shut down the status protection toggle, as opposed to endurance drain, it won't even have to be toggled back on, it'll just start working again, because they also changed how toggles are affected by mez around the same general time. But it can still happen to squishies. It does. And squishies don't have 3000 HP, like Whip did. They don't have auto resistances, like Whip did. Mezzed squishies can't queue up a high damage attack and one-shot a mezzer when they're free, like a scrapper or brute can. I've been in both sets of shoes. I know the deal, and I know that there's a disparity at work here. You need status protection to be able to do anything at all, on a melee character? The exact same truth applies to any character. Mezzed is mezzed, friend. It doesn't matter if you were mezzed from 60' or 6', you're still mezzed. The problem with the system now is that when your melee character is mezzed, he/she is ten times as likely to move on without a hitch, whereas when my squishie is mezzed, she's in serious trouble. I can't do anything when I'm mezzed any more than you can, but you can survive being mezzed much better than I can, even if all you do is take a break to make coffee. If mez is supposed to matter in this game, if it's supposed to mean something, why does it only matter, why does it only mean something, to those without status protection? Why is it only relevant to the characters with the lowest HP, lowest damage scalars, highest animation taxes for dealing with it? If it's intended to be an important part of gameplay, why isn't it equally important for everyone, rather than only important to squishies? If mez is supposed to be a cornerstone of the game and something that all players have to deal with, why aren't you paying the same taxes for it that I do?

Blasters can continue to use their T1 and T2 attacks through mez. And they have higher base HP than defenders/corruptors/controllers. Controllers have the lowest damage scalars, like masterminds, 0.55 melee and 0.55 ranged, and none of their primary powers deal much damage. How much damage does a mezzed defender or corruptor deal? What is the value of a detoggled buff/debuff, or a buff/debuff that can't be used because the character is mezzed? How much benefit does a character see from a 25% Resistance debuff if the character can't attack? How much survivability is added by a 15% ToHit debuff if the toggle which kept the debuff active was deactivated by mez? On long recharge timers, making then unusable for every spawn. And they have hit checks. Remind me, what hit checking does Fallout Shelter perform? Is that power only available once every other spawn, or every third spawn, or once per mission? You left out KB, KD, KU, sniping, Hover, temp pet tanking and a few other staples. I'm not new to Co*. I'm not new to playing squishies in Co*. I'm not even new to playing the weakest, least effective squishies. I also know that a tank can now deal more damage, more quickly, and with none of the risk I face on my squishies. That's not balance. Tanks were supposed to be a low damage archetype, that was their trade-off for being the most survivable. Now they're high damage and maximum survivability. I'm not complaining about tanks, mind you, I'm simply using that as an example of the imbalance between squishies and other archetypes. Squishies are the only ones being held, strictly, to an old, dead standard, taxed out the ass for reasons that aren't valid in the game these days, and it's inappropriate. I'm not posting about Rune of Protection. I don't have it on any of my existing characters. I don't have any builds planned to use it. I'm neither for nor against the change to it. I am posting about the gross inequity in status protection. Treating squishies like a lower class citizen in regard to status effects is a festering wound in this game, a cankerous boil that needs to be lanced. The longer it continues untreated, the worse it will be, and the more painful the treatment when it finally happens. The inequitable archetypal taxation has to be addressed. The only two outcomes are resolution, or revolution.

Using controls takes time. If you're facing three Tsoo Yellow Ink Men, that's time you have to spend mezzing each one. Does Unyielding work in a similar manner, forcing you to perform an animation for every mez you encounter? No, you're not rooted in place and locked out of your other powers while the toggle is dealing with the mez for you. This allows the toggle/click status protection user to progress more rapidly and respond instantly to other threats, while the squishie is forced to pay an animation tax just to proceed. Using controls can fail. There's always a 5% chance for a control to miss. Does Active Defense miss? No, of course not. Active Defense ensures that those three Tsoo Yellow Ink Men won't put your character to Sleep. But controls, due to the hit check mechanic, offer no similar guarantee. Controls don't deal much damage. Squishies already have low damage scalars, and they're required to use their least damaging powers to lead fights so they can prevent themselves from being mezzed. Meanwhile, other archetypes are leading with their strongest attacks, because they can ignore mez. They mop up all three of those Ink Men in seconds, while the squishies are still trying to prevent themselves from being mezzed. Break Frees aren't Rages, or Insights, or Lucks. Archetypes with toggle/click status protection can afford to bring some variety to their inspiration tray. Not only are they exempt from the status protection animation tax, and the potential for missing with their status protection, and dealing more damage by using their more powerful attacks to start fights, but they can also carry more combat inspirations to improve their efficiency and speed. Range is poor at providing defensive benefits in Co*. It doesn't offer increased Defense. There's no +Res_For_Being_At_Range modifier. Enemies can move into melee range. If the squishie's controls, the controls he/she was forced to use to make up for not having status protection, actually did the job, then range becomes a penalty, not a bonus. Those enemies are, presumably, mezzed, but the squishie is paying yet another tax, that of ranged damage being lower than melee damage. Don't say "teams". Cryptic started moving us away from that solution a long, long time ago. Paragon did nothing to steer us back toward it. The HC team opened up multiple "team only" avenues to solo players, so clearly, they're no more intent on forcing players to team for basic things than the previous developers were. The "team if you want status protection" horse died so long ago that it's not even a decomposing pile of bones at this point, it's dust. Squishies have to pay animation taxes, damage taxes and HP taxes "for having debuffs and controls" (everyone has some controls, and some debuffs, but everyone doesn't pay the same taxes, oddly). Any one of those three would be a sufficient limitation. All three together is... well, it leads to threads like this.

If you don't have toggle or click status protection: You're paying an animation time cost to protect yourself by pre-emptively mezzing the mezzers, opening your fights with a low-to-no damage mez; you're forced to use that mez on multiple foes, which ramps up the animation time cost significantly; and you're always at risk of missing, leaving yourself open to mez and unable to retaliate. OR You're paying an animation time cost to protect yourself by ToHit debuffing the mezzers, opening your fights with a click or toggle which deals no damage. These are unlikely to miss and more likely to be AoE/PBAoE, but still leave the player open to lucky hits which inflict mez, and in the case of offensive debuff toggles shut down. OR You're keeping your inspiration tray, e-mail and/or AH inventory full of Break Frees, which means you have no spare slots for heal/damage/defense/endurance inspirations, and are still subject to a hard limit, depending on when you run out of Break Frees. OR You're sacrificing powers in your build to acquire as much Defense as possible, through pool powers and/or IO set bonuses, in hopes of preventing status effects. OR You're dipping into Sorcery/Melee Core/Clarion. The arguments are that there's a massive discrepancy in how much time some archetypes have to spend preventing themselves from being mezzed, in comparison to how little time other archetypes have to spend performing the same basic function; that archetypes with status protection toggles and clicks have no 5% chance for their protection to fail and leave them helpless; that the archetypes most capable of taking the hits while mezzed are also the ones least likely to be mezzed, whereas the archetypes least capable of taking the hits while mezzed are the most likely to be mezzed; that reducing the duration of RoP will lead players to pursue the other options more, thus lessening diversity; that carrying around 20 Break Frees means not carrying around an assortment of other inspirations, thereby decreasing progression speed. More basically, the argument is that there's a serious balance problem in how status effects affect different archetypes, and some players feel that this problem needs to be addressed, rather than one of the partial solutions nerfed.

Lies. He flipped them.

Looking at this thread caused my latest respec to fail. I want a refund. And a ponicorn.

It's not about what might happen. It's not about being right, or proving someone else wrong. It's not about initiating change. It's about what is happening. It's about understanding, so we can approach discussions from an informed perspective. It's about bettering ourselves by asking questions and looking for answers. If the only thing that comes out of this thread is a little more knowledge, it's worth continuing indefinitely.

HOOP! There it is! HOOP! There it is! Also, I chase the ones that make squeaky noises. They're more fun to catch than the ones that just lie down and accept their fate.

Batman has Batsuits stashed all over the world, and keeps a suit in his briefcase, and in his Bentley, and in the Batmobile, and in the Batjet, and in his office in Wayne Tower, and... well, you get the point. The X-Men have suits stashed with their transportation. The Flash has a suit in his special ring. Hulk no wear boots! Puny footwear! Superman... is apparently always wearing his suit, but where does he hide his boots? Does he wear shoes a couple of sizes larger than he'd normally wear so he can wear his super suit boots all of the time (with socks over the super suit boots (wouldn't that force him to wear shoes three sizes too large (at this point, he's either running around with Rob Liefeld feet, or clown shoes)))? Are they hidden in the old prison wallet? Does he make new boots every time he changes, using his Super Cobbling power? I should've asked myself this question 40 years ago... but how often do you look at a man's shoes?

Wonder Woman and Legionette. Best super-team ever.

I'm attracted to desolation. Wandering the wasteland in the Fallout 3 and up games, looking inside the remnants of houses, scouring office buildings to see what little props and easter egg scenes the developers set up, walking the length and breadth of the sewers and subways, just taking it all in. I do this in reality, too. There are hundreds of abandoned homes scattered all over the counties near my cabin. I stop once in a while when I see one, go inside, see what kind of life someone had, try to figure out when the last time was that anyone lived there. I'm looking at the past, but I'm also looking at the future, because everything will fall down, eventually. Our impermanence sits all around us, hinting at what's to come. So Boomtown is my favorite map. It's the most desolate and ruined. I also hate Boomtown more than any other map, because I can't go inside any of those decrepit buildings. I can't explore. Unless I have a mission in that zone, I can't enter a single structure. It's a harsh reminder of how lacking some of the development in this game was. They could've echoed what Bethesda did with Fallout 3. Instead, it's just empty and unused, a waste of potential.

No. Make the same character, power-level it up if you prefer, enroll the new one in a different SG. Rinse, repeat as necessary to play the same character across multiple SGs. The only real difference, then, is the name.

Alts.

See, I would've assumed that it was either catgirls trying to cook, or someone's date night going well.

Fear of what? Seriously, how do you think the development team is going to frighten us? Tax audits? An in-game housing crunch? Forcing us to trade in our capes for aprons? We grew up. We're not frightened of arbitrary penalties in video games.

No mechanics in place to support that. If Containment triggered double damage for other players' attacks, that'd be teamwork. If taunted critters were more easily affected by status effects or debuffs, that'd be teamwork. If "damage dealer" archetypes left a lingering effect when they used their attacks, like a little Absorb PBAoE or -Res on targets other than the one they're attacking, which benefited teammates but not them, that'd be teamwork. We have powers which aid our teammates and provide some small interaction, typically in the form of "make X go down faster" and "make X less dangerous to us", but there's no actual teamwork built into them. There are a few mechanics which encourage teaming, like increased XP/inf rewards and shitty inherents like Vigilance and Cosmic Balance, but nothing that rewards teamwork. And there are only a handful of missions which require anything even remotely resembling teamwork. Pull the AV away from the cysts... send the <archetype> to <do thing only <archetype> can do>... keep this AV away from that AV so they don't do <thing>... yeah, that about covers the list. Missions weren't designed around teamwork. You don't pull the AV into a room, trigger a spiky death trap and fight off waves of allies attempting to release it. You don't hold off multiple AVs while half the team works on consoles to raise a barrier between them in order to cut off their links to one another. Almost everything in the game can be soloed because almost everything in the game was designed for solo players, including team content. That team content doesn't add mechanics to make teamwork necessary, it just buffs enemy levels. We face harder foes than +4 minions and lieutenants before we can even access decent enhancements, much less have anywhere to put them. Missions don't require or reward teamwork, any more than our characters do. You want teamwork? Build it into the game. Without the mechanics, it's just asking people to stand around, pointlessly and needlessly, waiting for... fucked if I know. A golden ticket? Leprechaun Hanukah? The Rapture?

Limits are limits. If you decided to stop adding Resistance when you hit 43%, it'd be functionally identical to the HC team capping your Resistance at 43%. But at least, in setting the limit for yourself, you're making a choice, rather than obeying a dictate. I'd rather be free to make that choice than a slave to someone else's decision. And choosing to impose our own limitations forces us to find alternative solutions, different approaches, which wouldn't exist at all if developer-imposed limits of a similar nature were in place. That makes us better players by expanding our knowledge and pushing us to work harder.

Stagnation engenders ennui.

In sense of stepping on each others' toes and curb-stomping the archetype barriers people imagined, perhaps. The archetypes weren't designed like classes in EQ/WoW, to complement one another and work together cooperatively, they were designed to be completely self-contained and independent units which were capable of filling multiple roles when teamed. Every one of the original archetypes infringed on every one of the other originals from the beta stage, in multiple ways, and that was both a deliberate design choice, to ensure that this game never fell into the holy trinity model; and encouraged post-release to attract the players who liked the MMORPG model but didn't want to be dependent on others for basic progression. The release of CoV, with five "new" archetypes that turned out to be variations and/or hybrids of the existing archetypes, didn't move the game away from that, not by a single micrometer. Nor has anything that's been added since then. Not Praetorian content, not Inventions, not Incarnates, nothing. Every archetype ran roughshod over every other archetype's bailiwick, from the beta stage onward, and people have bitched about feeling useless when in teams since the game went live, despite embracing the game for the very same quality that made that "problem" exist, the solo-friendly design of every archetype. So yes, I tell you, it absolutely has been this way since 2003. Teaming has never been about working together to overcome long odds in Co*, it's always been about socialization, because the design of the game was centered on the individual, not the group. We teamed then because we wanted to team, not because we had to, and we still do it for the same reason today. The only difference between then and now is that more people have realized that teaming in this game is just throwing a bunch of soloers into a room together and letting them run wild, because it was designed that way. The only purpose you, or I, or anyone else has ever brought to any team has been the purpose we created for ourselves.

Wombats? Sugar gliders? PORCUPINES?! ARE THEY PORCUPINES?! *squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee*

We'd have to remove defenders, corruptors, controllers and masterminds entirely, all power pools, most of the powers in the remaining primaries and secondaries, and inspirations... most of the controls would also have to go, so dominators would take a hike, too, and the majority of the buffs and debuffs attached to individual powers. Those are the things that are actually causing some people to feel discontent with how teaming plays out, not IOs, Incarnates or *PPs.

The game was designed to ensure that no archetype was necessary on a team. Concurrent with that design choice, content couldn't provide more challenge than any random collection of individuals could complete, and that included the possibility of eight petless masterminds with no enhancements. The challenge that you feel is missing, isn't, because it never existed outside our own personal preconceptions. You're seeing it differently now because you have the benefit of previous experience and easier access to certain resources, but that's a change in perception, not in the game's level of challenge. It's been like this since 2003. There's no problem to fix, as far as balance, power or teaming. If you're not feeling challenged, or necessary, or entertained when you're on a team, then you need to say so. Talk to your teammates. That's really the only reason they're there. Posting about it doesn't resolve your issue with that team, or future teams. Speak up when the problem is at hand, not hours later, and you just might find your team experience to be more in line with what you prefer.

You're part of that. No communication? Speak up. Feeling useless? Speak up. Bored? Speak up. IOs don't prevent you, or anyone on your team, from typing, or speaking into a microphone. If you're dissatisfied with anything on a team, speak up. That's the purpose of teams, to provide a social experience.