Luminara

Corruptors use a lower debuff scale than defenders. So do controllers and masterminds.

I work Sunday and Monday mornings. When I woke up yesterday (Sunday), it was raining. Not a big deal, I've worked in the rain before, but it was also 48 degrees Fahrenheit, and I didn't have a fire going because it was almost 70 when I went to bed. So the 48 degrees outside meant 48 degrees in the cabin. Since the last three weeks have followed the pattern of being chilly in the early morning (early being 4 a.m. onward), I figured I'd tough it out and warm up later. So I had my coffee, responded to posts and prepared to go to work. Walked outside to start my bike at 7:45, remembered that I wanted to fill the tank and did that... It wouldn't start. A few months ago, I would've expected that. I was riding a rat bike I built, and it wasn't the most reliable transportation (in fact, it died on the way to work at the end of August). This bike is brand new, though. Fresh off of the factory floor, first butt in the seat is mine, never been ridden anywhere by anyone else new, and it shouldn't have any problems. In fact, in the three weeks I've been riding it, it hasn't. So I was really worried, and more than a little annoyed, and it was raining. I'm intelligent, though. Or maybe I'm not, it could just be that I understand machines the way I understand animals, intuitively, and I'm actually a complete moron. I wouldn't know if that were the case, and it wouldn't bother me. Point being, I knew I could fix it, once I found the issue. So I set about finding that issue. I checked the hoses and wiring, made sure there wasn't anything obvious like a loose spark plug boot, and noticed that the drain for the carburetor bowl was easily accessible. Hey, might as well spend the 15 seconds opening that. No fuel. What the fudge factory? I just poured over a gallon of gasoline into the tank, and the tank was 1/3rd full before I did that. Fuel should be streaming out of of the drain. The fuel lines were good. The vacuum lines were good. The tank was free of detritus. Finally decided the problem was the vacuum-operated fuel pump/petcock. I'd read many complaints about them going bad on similar bikes, but I hadn't expected a problem to manifest this early in the bike's life. I tried tapping it, I tried massaging the vacuum line, I tried massaging the fuel line, still no fuel going into the filter. Then I remembered that I had an unused fuel line of the correct inner diameter, and long enough to reach outside of the housing. Popped that in place, stuck the other end in my mouth and started pumping with my breath. Create pressure, reverse pressure. Gas rushed into the fuel filter. I kept going for half a minute, to be sure the carb bowl would be filled, reattached the vacuum line to the petcock, stuck my foot on the kick starter and... it started on the second kick. To boil it down, I had to do a suck and blow job to get a ride yesterday morning. 😧 This morning, I caught up on relevant posts and decided to play a bit, since I couldn't yesterday (didn't wake up until 5 a.m., and spent all of my time before work posting). I'm sitting here on my love seat, walloping things with Cross Punch/Air Superiority/Sting of the Wasp on Antianeira, listening to the cats to the cats playing in the sink. Oh, yeah, I installed a sink this past spring. Still no running water, and the frame I built to hold the sink is... well, a bunch of scrap wood I had lying around, and it looks like scrap wood, but at least I don't have to wash dishes in a bucket now. Then the cats started doing something next to the sink. My mind connected dots. They weren't interested in the water in the bowl and pot in the sink, or clinking the spoon in the bowl, there was something else drawing their attention. I looked over at Jessica and May. Huge fucking wolf spider. Huge. Body the size of my thumb. Leg span as large as my palm. H U G E . Now, I respect spiders. They're amazing, they really are. They keep insect populations under control, and some of them are extraordinarily beautiful, like the banded garden spider. That's actually my favorite spider, and one of my favorite living creatures, I love looking at them. But big, hairy, creepy spiders... I had a 7 year old child moment. It's a damn good thing I live in a forest, because, if I had neighbors, there'd be half of a police precinct outside, investigating what they thought to be a homicide in progress. I grabbed Jessica and May, unceremoniously deposited them on the love seat, and found a small semi-opaque container to put over the monstrosity. Found something to slide underneath, flipped it over and slammed a cover on the container. Took it outside and convulsed as I was shaking the container out... that spider may have entered orbit. I didn't mean to fling it that hard, I just couldn't control the spasm that rippled through me. NOT A GOOD WAY TO START THE DAY. It's not raining any more, the bike ran perfectly every time I started and rode it yesterday after the petcock problem was resolved, my wood stove is still putting out heat and the weather report indicates a high of 70. Hopefully, today will be less... eventful.

Useless. No, I'm going to be blunt, it's crap. Even enhanced, it wouldn't provide 0.000001% increase in survivability or combat effectiveness. It accomplishes absolutely nothing. It's not even 5%, which might be leveraged by a full team using sapping techniques, it's just 5 endurance. I'm sincerely hoping it's a placeholder for something worthwhile, or at least interesting.

There are no changes to OSA being made in this beta, and no other indication that @Captain Powerhouse screwed something up and accidentally altered OSA in any way. Do you have screenshots of the damage numbers, or a combat log to post? A defender should be seeing roughly 6.5 damage per tick, accounting for enhancements (95% Damage), with no -Res on the targets and no buffs (Aim, Assault) on the caster. The cast time is for OSA, the power which creates OilSlickOil and summons OilSlickTarget. OilSlickBurn's tick rate isn't tied to the power's cast time. OSBurn has no cast time to summon, beyond the 0.132s server tick (Arcanatime), it's spawned as soon as OSTarget is destroyed. It then ticks off 75 pulses of damage checks (95% hit rate due to the 25% Defense debuff on OSOil), at full enhanced, or buffed (buffs on the caster are transferred to pseudo-pets for whatever duration remains on the buff), value. That's how it works. The cast time isn't related to pulse timing.

Sure can. But it wouldn't be thematic with the rest of the teleport powers, which, at a guess, is why it was left as a location-targeted power.

250.2 damage. OSA applies a 25% Defense debuff. 25'. All enhancements are accounted for properly in OSA, OSTarget and OSBurn. https://web.archive.org/web/20120904191645/http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=122243 You were saying?

-Def is defense debuffing, which is in Acid and OSA, -strength Def is defense debuff resistance debuffing, which is in Ice.

In Ice Arrow.

It's a support power in a support set, not a controller power, not a damage power. That's not the direction the HC team wants to take TA toward. It's a support power in a support set, not a damage power. That's not the direction the HC team wants to take TA toward. TA has one Immobilize. TA has one Immobilize. It deals as much base damage as most of the blaster T9 powers. /Fire Blast, /Energy Blast, /Electrical Blast, /Dual Pistols, /Archery, /Assault Rifle, /Beam Rifle, /Radiation Blast, /Sonic Blast and /Water Blast all have attacks which can ignite OSA. The Apprentice Charm and Taser Dart origin powers can ignite OSA. Numerous temporary powers can ignite OSA. Energy and Fire damage procs can ignite OSA. Teammates and pets can ignite OSA. Critters can ignite OSA. ... 🤨 It has -ToHit, which is appropriate for a debuff set. It has -Damage, which is appropriate for a debuff set. It's a debuffing support set, not a control set, not a buff set, not a damage set. That's not the direction the HC team wants to take TA toward. Yes, that's correct. And reduce their hit chances, and reduce their Defense, and reduce their Resistances, and reduce their attack recharge speed, and reduce their movement speed, and reduce their resistances to debuffs, and knock them down, and decimate spawns with a DoT equivalent to blaster nukes, and... Are you sure you tested TA, not something else?

Regen debuffs are more effective.

I'm going to turn myself into a guided missile with this thing. A screaming, flailing guided missile of slashing, punching, stabbing, thwapping happiness.

And Siege. Freaking Siege. Grrrrrrrrrrrr.

Does CT move your character fully into melee range, or is it like /follow, where it offers you a cup of coffee at the diner first date and suggests that maybe you should wait until you see where things are going before entering melee range? If you queue an attack, does it trigger as soon as CT moves you to the target? I'd test it myself, but, Verizon.

Yesterday - 80 degrees Fahrenheit. This morning - 45 degrees Fahrenheit. And raining. And no fire in the wood stove because it's been 80-90 all week. Your requested winter event stalled right over my cabin. My socks are wet now. I hope you're happy, @Myrmidon.

The exploit was discovered somewhat recently (not yesterday, or last week, it's been a while). If they'd known earlier, they would've shut it down ASAP. The fact that they've poured as many hours as they have into redesigning transport options, though, and the length of time the exploit has been known to them, suggests to me that it's not fixable. No, I understand, and I wasn't disagreeing with anything you said. I just wanted to put that information in the thread again so more people would see it, and your post was as good a jumping off point as any.

It's already been stated at least twice, but it bears repeating - there's another problem with the slash command, it's exploitable and it has to be removed. Not limited to only out of combat, or only out of PvP zones, but removed. It's not a fixable problem. It has to go. Everyone will understand when the beta ends, until then, please, honestly, please, realize that it's necessary and for everyone's benefit to remove it. It's that serious.

40% AoE -Recharge. Glue is 90% Slow.

A duration reduction to 30s would be fine, but given that Weaken's AoE -Special is nearly the same strength (75% versus Ice's 86%), in addition to the higher -Dam (nearly twice Ice's) plus -ToHit (same base as Flash Arrow), and Benumb's -Special is also 75%, plus Benumb has significantly higher -Dam (triple Ice's), and -Regen (500%), I don't think gutting Ice's -Special is warranted. It's not going to hold the primary target, the boss, in one application, and it's lacking the extras that Benumb and Weaken bring to the team.

It is close to the top. It's better at some debuffs (something i never expected to say, but here we are), not as good at others, and it's got a wider range of debuffs than most support sets. It's unlikely that the HC team will improve the debuffs any further, given how powerful they are now and their stated objective of evening out the differences between "best of the best" and "worst of the worst". Unless someone can show some conclusive evidence that there's still a survivability issue, the numbers on it now probably won't change. It's really all going to come down to how the set performs for masterminds. That's where any survivability problems will manifest. For defenders, the -Dam and -ToHit alone are guaranteed survivability factors. Controllers and corruptors shouldn't see many problems, either. And for all three of those archetypes, the increased -Res, -Regen and newly added -Special will open the doors to the AV parties, as well as aiding them much more in regular play. But masterminds... if the set drops the ball for that archetype, then we're talking about needing more to bring it up to par.

If the TA has the gumption to stand within the AoE radius, he/she should gain the same benefits as the other players in the radius. I'm not sure what prompted @Captain Powerhouse to exclude the caster.

Those numbers should be listed twice in the power info window. One is the unresisted value, the other is the resistible value.

Yes. The unresisted flag doesn't bypass the Purple Patch, only other forms of resistance. Target - level 54 Arch-villain Radiation Infection: 4x Dark Watcher's Despair (57.52%), 49.22% -ToHit (49.22 * 0.48 (Purple Patch)) * 0.13 (AV Resistance) = 3.07% -ToHit applied Flash Arrow: 4x Dark Watcher's Despair (57.52%), 29.54% -ToHit (29.54 * 0.48 (Purple Patch)) = 14.18 14.18 / 2 = 7.09 7.09 * 0.13 = 0.92 0.92 + 7.09 = 8.01% -ToHit applied Flash Arrow's debuff isn't taking a back seat here. Even if a Rad defender has an opportunity to use Fallout, and has that enhanced to the same 57.52% (70.13% diminished by ED), Flash Arrow still leads. The same is going to occur with -Damage. The unresisted flag has TA leading Rad in -Dam in AV fights. And Slows/-Recharge, because TA has more, plus Acid. The -Regen issue is slightly more complicated, but someone else did the math on the closed beta forum and TA, even with a ~40 second down time on EMP Arrow, still came out as only slightly lower than Rad. Over the duration of a long fight, TA's effective -Regen is less than 10% lower than Rad's. When coupled with TA's new higher -Res total, the difference should be negligible. Outside of AV combat, yes, TA is going to have lower -ToHit than Rad. Rad also has a continuing toggle cost to maintain Radiation Infection, Radiation Infection can move with a target (meaning, the toggle target can run out of the area where combat is occurring, leaving 0% -ToHit on the rest of the spawn. it can also run into another spawn, unintentionally pulling multiple other critters to the Rad defender, none of whom are debuffed), and it can toggle off when the corpse despawns or the toggle target moves beyond the leash range (the distance at which the toggle shuts down). This is a balance trade-off. TA has a a lower value, but no on-going toggle cost, no chance of the debuff wandering out of leash range and shutting down, no potential for additional aggro. And, realistically, 14.18% is not a negligible amount. It's not as much as Rad could apply to +4 critters, but it doesn't have to be in order to be effective when used in concert with the other debuffs in TA's quiver. There's more to the game than +Def/-ToHit. TA's not supposed to match Rad, or Storm, or any other set, it's supposed to do its own thing while still being effective. It's not "as good" as Rad in some ways, but Rad isn't "as good" as TA in other ways. That's exactly where the set should be. It's competitive. It's different from every other set, but it's not numerically inferior to everything else in every other set with these changes. It does some things better than other sets, and it doesn't do some things as well as other sets do, and it does some things differently, but comparably. Numerically, TA is actually right where you say it isn't, at the middle. It doesn't debuff some things as well as Storm or Rad, but it also isn't sitting at the bottom of the barrel on anything, in comparison to any set, and it debuffs some things better than any other set. Where comparisons can be made, apples to apples, it's middle of the road with the current changes, and in no case is it too low to be viable in anything. But all of what I've said is presuming defender values. TA needs to be tested on masterminds to ensure that it's truly where it needs to be. If it passes there, it's solid. If not, then I'll wholeheartedly agree with your assessment and start shouting at CP.

I wasn't dismissing them. I was suggesting that he investigate the changes personally and draw a conclusion from direct evidence. Test. Poke. Prod. Tear it apart and find out what works and what doesn't. Ask questions, then go to the test server and find out the answers. I did offer my opinion on what the final impact would be - an notable improvement, but not dismissively, and if that was how it came across, I apologize. Lastly, I can guarantee that you'll see an Ill/TA. Mine, if no-one else's. She's parked and waiting for the changes to be finalized so I can redesign the build, along with all of my other TA characters (TA/Dark defender, Beasts/TA mastermind, Plant/TA controller, Fire/TA corruptor, Grav/TA controller, Elec/TA controller and TA/Water defender). As you might surmise, I'm not approaching this from the perspective of a casual observer. 70% -Damage, 25% of that can't be resisted. 18.75% -ToHit, half of which can't be resisted. Those two alone are massive improvements over their original values and do exactly what the set needed to provide sufficient mitigation as a defensive support set, at every level. 40% -Special, 60% -Res and half of EMP Arrow's -Regen lasting 45 seconds instead of 15 seconds adds significantly to TA's combat versatility and bring TA up to par for end-game content. It's strong now. But don't listen to me, go test it. Find holes. Look for problems. Debating the numbers on the forums won't lead to anything, testing is necessary. So go to the test server and see what it can do. Then post, so @Captain Powerhouse can fix what's not working or tweak what needs to be tweaked, before it goes to the live servers and sits for another 15 years unattended. I say that not dismissively, but objectively.