Chris24601

Yeah, ADDING Endurance/min. would be fine, but in actual practice the Rec/sec. and End used/sec. are MUCH easier for figuring out sustainable attack chains and the like. This is because power activations are measured in seconds so End cost / activation time gives you how much End/sec. that power is eating. If that plus your toggle costs is higher than your Rec/sec. then you know your END bar will be going down so you either need some lighter powers later in the chain or plan around keeping enough blues in your inspiration tray to deal with longer fights.

Not sure I quite get your distinction on morality vs. ethics. The terms are generally considered synonymous (even by philosophers of ethics). For that matter, in the few places that DO make such a distinction, morality is almost invariably held to be a higher ideal than ethics (with morality positioned as right vs. wrong while ethics is lawful vs. unlawful) so I don’t quite get why Superman placing a higher ideal above a lesser one would be regarded as a negative thing. If I’m going to have a de facto physical god as a hero in a setting I’d much rather have one who puts doing the right thing over following the law because laws can be unjust and even evil. Returning runaway slaves in the Antebellum South was the law. I’ll ALWAYS side with the hero who says “I’m helping these slaves escape because its the right thing to do” over one who says “I am ethically bound to follow the law and return these human beings to their enslavement.” That second guy is a villain using unjust laws as an excuse for his actions. Superman AND Captain America (and any hero of mine) would punch that second guy in the face and rescue the slaves from him. Superman putting morality ahead of ethics sounds more like a feature than a bug to me.

Not really a solution so much as a workaround is that I use [civilian name]-[hero name] for my names. There’s a lot less chance of both parts being previously taken. The only downside is the character limit for name means you have to keep both short. Alternatively, if there’s no reason for a particular concept to have a secret identity then I just use a given name. Lots of my magic origin toons who are members of the Midnight Squad go that route.

I started one, but there’s this really off-putting reverb and volume mismatch on the associated sound-effect for the single-target hold that is completely out of sync with the rest of the set and I just had to drop and re-roll as something else. The best way I can describe is, if you were listening to rest of the set from a speaker 10 feet away, the ST hold sounds like you moved to 5 feet from the speaker and turned the base up. It’d be one thing of the whole set was like that; Grav is probably my favorite set and it is a noisy set... but it’s a consistent level of noisy. Since this is a personal tick I don’t need it changed if everyone else likes it. What I could use help with though are finding the file names for sounds effects of the darkness control single target hold and immobilize so I can do a sound file swap in data folder (I want both the immobilize and hold to use the immobilize sound effect). THAT would entirely take care of my problem (and I can roll up a toon for it because the play was nice other than that one sound). Thank you to whoever could help with that in advance. 😊

Here’s their exact words from the 2012 AMA courtesy of ParagonWiki; After the Battalion, what was the next "big idea" that was going to come down the road, if you had thought that far ahead? MM: The Dimensionless are a race of beings superior to the Wells. Dealing with them once you became a well unto yourself was the next logical step. STM: One of the ideas was that you kind of “cheat” to defeat Battalion, in essence doing something that should take you being level 50 ++++++++ and doing it at level 50, shattering the source of Battalion. However, this meant that a ton of things that were controlled by Battalion were now freed to do whatever they want, so the threats were unknown but out there, and now it was the responsibility of the players to go out there and handle them. ETA: My key takeaways from those quotes in terms of power-up grind were “once you became a well unto yourself” and that the Dimensionless were superior to the Wells and would have to be dealt with.

That. Was unfortunate. Basically killed all rewatch value the series had (knowing what became of Product Placement Pete’s actor didn’t help the early seasons either). On a related note though, and in relation to the dislike of Superman for certain “moral but not ethical” things by the poster you were replying to, it does highlight... which VERSION of Superman do they mean? Golden Age is not Silver Age is not Post-Crisis is not New52 is not Rebirth is not Christopher Reeve films is not Diniverse is not Lois & Clark is not Smallville is not DCEU is not Arrowverse Superman. I doubt that other than the most basic premises there’s anything consistent enough to complain about as a defining trait... not even the “love triangle for two” which all modern versions since Smallville have abandoned, with Lois finding out from either before the start (DCEU and Smallville) to Clark revealing the secret within months (Arrowverse and current comics) is consistent between versions. At this point trying to pin a particular character flaw on Superman is like trying to ascribe one to Robin Hood. At best, you can critique one particular interpretation.

I’m quite happy with Gravity as it is. At the lowest levels immobilize and rag-doll knockup on short timers reduces your incoming damage significantly while you still have enough health relative to damage dealt at those levels for that to be significant. Lift, particularly with your level 3 slots and the prestige damage/recharge enhancements, does significant damage at those levels and recharges in 4s so you’ve got an attack every 2s even before any P2W powers at level 3. Gravity Distortion with its 8s timer doesn’t do enough to mitigate incoming damage on its own. You need lift or crush (or both) with it to juggle and defeat a typical spawn and the occasional over-aggro without face planting (plus crush, grav distortion and lift are a reasonable attack chain you can have in place by level 4). They also are low enough on Endurance cost to be manageable when you have virtually no slots. Not every set has to be a cookie cutter with different graphic FX on top. Gravity is a set that skews more towards damage with its hold doing more damage and lift/propel as heavy hitters (particularly with containment/impact) with mitigation via knockdown (using grav distortion first cancels the knockback). I am rediscovering my love for the set as I rebuild my “chaostroller” (grav/storm), the synergy between hurricane and crush/crushing field in just disabling all ability of enemies to retaliate is fantastic. Throw in wormhole to throw them all in a corner with singularity, tornado and lightning storm while you hold them there with crushing field and hurricane... I almost pity the poor mobs.

::Looks at my store bought blackwand and Skipper’s anti-ghost divining rod and the holy shotgun shells from that guy in Striga:: Maybe because its magic? 😄

As I recall from the AMAs they said we’d basically “cheat” our way up the Incarnate ladder to beat the Battalion and would basically end up with each PC being their own Well and this would draw the notice and ire of the Dimensionless who somehow oversaw the Wells and would be basically Coming Storm 2.0. Now, I don’t mind the “basically, you cheat” method of beating an enemy group. Changing the nature of the conflict against an unstoppable foe to an arena where you CAN fight them is superhero 101 (a prime example is the first Iron Man film. Tony can’t beat Stane’s suit in a head-to-head... but did Stane solve the icing problem? That turns the tide). What I dislike is the “now you permanently have even MORE power” ending. Superman or Spider-Man don’t gain radically new powers when they overcome even cosmic threats. They “cheat” then go back to their baseline. With HC free of the need to sell new content and grind to make a profit, THAT can actually be the norm of new stories here. If an opponent’s too big for head-to-head (ex. Empowered Recluse at the end of MLTF) then we “cheat” (take out his empowerment machine first) in order to win the day. I realize the genie is out of the bottle, but if could make one probably unpopular change to City of Heroes, I would have removed all the Incarnate powers and re-tuned the Praetorian War content to be normal 50-54 content. Cole still feels the need to invade due to the threat a “chaotic” world like Primal Earth poses to his deal with Praetorian Hamidon, but there’s no “empowered by the Well which wants a champion before the Battalion show up” nonsense muddying that up. I think the game would be healthier if The Well had never been introduced (except as the magical source of States and Recluse’s powers) and the Battalion were just alien conquerors strong enough to eventually enslave the Khelds as fuel sources instead of Well-collectors. But the genie IS out of the bottle and so the best thing to do is limit the damage by declaring the incarnate system “complete” with its six slots with 4 tiers while your character concept is still somewhere to be seen under the powers the live devs designed to have you grind for like traditional MMO loot drops. Keeping it to one general level shift and two incarnate shifts at least means normal content can be +3 to your level and non-shifted incarnate foes can still be +1 to your level. One passive boost power, one proc effect on your attacks, one nuke, one summon, one PBAoE party buff and one two-minute toggle buff is quite a lot, but a lot still depends on your original build too. I don’t know if that would still be the case if we had been able to grind all the way to a hypothetical four more incarnate slots with how many more incarnate shifts and an “Omega” slot (which should mean “done” except if it HAD kept the doors open they’d have needed an Omega+ slot and then an Omega++ slot to keep the grind going). But we thankfully don’t have to find out because we can at least declare HCs incarnate system done while still weak enough that the Natural origin character can declare that their Ionic Judgement is an orbital ion cannon strike from a Vanguard satellite and the minimal FX Vanguard Lore pets are actual Vanguard troops who teleported in to assist you... and still mostly has to rely on their own abilities to get things done. Let’s beat the Battalion the comic-book way; Cheat and then go back to baseline... in this case meaning no more incarnate tags on new content so it’s just one level shift (the Well no longer needs to pump extra power into you) and the incarnate power levels we have now (not to say there couldn’t be new options for the existing slots... just not more powerful ones).

The correct level for true hardcore is 50 with 0 vet levels and no Oroboros badges; but still having all six incarnate slots equipped with T4s. This means you only played through Dark Astoria once (no repeating the first mission chain dozens of times for Emps/incarnate salvage) and got the rest entirely by grinding for it on repeatable content like iTrials. At least that would be MY definition of hardcore.

The first I liked, particularly since a part of that was going to be opening up the Patron Power Pools to Heroes without their having to alignment switch. Basically you run a story arc for the redeemed Scirocco to get the badge you need to unlock the Patron Pools. The second I REALLY wasn't a fan of because it set the players into the role of sidekicks to big hero Dream Doctor who sacrifices it all to save the world and THEN also includes a follow-up where the Shadow Shard collapses and goes away (as in the zones were going to be removed from the game) because Rularuu is no longer there to sustain it. Along with the power escalation involving then facing the EVEN MORE POWERFUL Dimensionless and then THE MORER POWERFULLER masters behind the Dimenionless before finally just having to re-launch a City of Heroes 2 because the CoH1 characters would then be Galactus/Monitor level beings) showed me that the dev team in 2012 had either; A) run out of creative ideas. B) were getting so much pressure from NCSoft to make CoH a traditional grindfest MMO that such things were all they could focus on. -or- C) both. That CoH got shut down when it did may have been something of a backhanded blessing in disguise because the Homecoming team and those of other servers aren't married to continuing that self-destructive chain of MMO grind and can instead look at other ways to continue the story in new ways. I've laid out previously how I think a better way to do the Coming Storm is via a pile-up of smaller threats that break the camel's back (rather like Positron's TF writ large with the Clockwork, Circle and Vahzilok all having schemes involving the dam) requiring cooperation to overcome instead of just "MORE POWER!!!" The Battalion end up being a Rikti+ invasion (literally... Rikti-tech is basically reverse engineered from the Battalion who invaded Earth in their dimension millennia ago) that happens to land about the same time there's a new push by the Rula'shin to free Rularuu, the new Council/5th Civil War goes hot and a couple more things all happening at once that only a City of Heroes (and Villains) working together can stop from destroying the world. In my head as I've continued to develop the idea, I think there need to be FIVE simultaneous threats; one for each of the origins. Rularuu would be magic and could involve a revamp of the Shadow Shard content (maybe swapping out the generic soldier mobs for Vanguard and Midnight Squad, but not doing too much with the actual geography). The Battalion would probably be Science, a merging of Primal and Praetorian Hami could be the Mutant element, etc. The point is that you could create the Coming Storm without having to completely reinvent the game or up the current power levels to get there. Just make the focus on needing multiple supers to actually overcome these threats (meaning some teams have to be in the Shadow Shard fighting the Rularuu resurgence, others fighting off Battalion attacks and still others facing a multi-dimensional Hamidon threat.

This is proof of "different strokes for different folks." Superman and Captain America are among my favorite DC/Marvel heroes precisely because of their strong moral stands and being paragons meant for others to aspire to... with pre-Flashpoint Superboy (+Wonder Girl and Krypto; BFF's Tim and Bart as third and fourth) being probably my favorite DC/Marvel characters ever. Of the rest only Steel as a guy inspired to heroism by Superman had any resonance for me. Cyborg and Eradicator even before their villain reveals were pure 90's Dork Age schlock, specifically created by the writing team to lampoon fanboy ideas of how to make Superman "better" (with each one save Steel actually falling short morally in some critical way and Steel's failure simply being that human tech just couldn't actually compete well with Kryptonian physiology). Basically, the entire story arc of death and return was a big THIS IS WHY THE REAL SUPERMAN IS IMPORTANT!!! directed at the fans (and it worked, sales after the arc were notably stronger for the Superman titles, with the c. 2000 back to basics revamp that focused on strong storytelling using the classic characters being the next time his sales strengthened considerably). So no... if they're going to bring Statesman back it needs to be the REAL Statesman or its missing the point. That said, I don't think they should bring him back mainly because YOU are supposed to be the main character in City of Heroes universe and, as ham-handed as they were with it, they set up States death as a "finally he can rest" event rather than as something that was a tragedy. Yanking him out of the afterlife with his beloved wife and daughter (who had lived a full life of 72 years before she died) would actually be a punishment for him at this stage. rather than some grand return. Despite surface similarities to Superman (actually he's closer to a Captain Marvel/Shazam expy with his powered by the gods and lightning), he's actually much closer to the pathos of MCU Steve Rogers as a man stuck out of his time. He's a very old man in a young body whose lost virtually all of his formative friends to old age, but felt too duty-bound to just give up because he thought the world depended on him (the default flaw of every Marcus Cole) and the realization that the world will keep spinning without him is actually a great relief and why when you find him dead he has a small smile on his face. Let the old man rest and be happy in the afterlife that is confirmed to exist in the CoH Universe; its time for new heroes (your own) to rise in his place.

Not to be pedantic, but I’m pretty sure the native environment for Khelds was actually a home star (as in, they lived ON a star) and not a home world. I also suggest that “went supernova” sounds much cooler than just “destroyed.” Do with that what you will. 😁

I figure Wyvern was supposed to be the more morally grey vigilante group and with Manitcores darker turn maybe they could get some better funding to add Tactical Arrow to their bag of tricks and move beyond level 20 as a threat. The other part of my thinking is that cleaning out Longbow would actually make a reasonable story arc Blue-side where you actually have to go after the nastier elements and bring them in while Red-side you get a reintroduction to the cleaned up Longbow and maybe perform a jailbreak from the outside on whatever facility is going to replace the Zigg. Sidebar: That’s another huge plot-point; the Pandora’s Box arc revealed they were using the box as the source of the Zigg’s power dampening and that’s gone now. What to do about all the super criminals who can more easily escape is a massive arc all on its own. For a SCARY twist... Malta goes public as “saviors” after a big breakout with the reveal of their anti-meta nanotech (as I recall, the nanotechnology was one of the reasons non-incarnates couldn’t participate in Apex/Tin Mage and unslotted ones got bumped down to level 46). They manuever for control over the Zigg and get the city bureaucrats to comply and then start running Suicide Squad style blackops using the villains imprisoned there.* * Used as an excuse to add metas akin to the Longbow Wardens and signature villains to the Malta enemy group to up their challenge by having more varied bosses.

The problem there is that Miss Liberty was murdered in the same arc Statesman was so Ms. Liberty lost both her mom and grandpa suddenly to violence one right after the other in that arc. We don’t know the status of her father, but given that Miss Liberty was 72 when she died in 2012 and was not mentioned at all in any of the related material (ex. there were in-universe obituaries and news stories about the funeral put up on Paragon Studios website) I think it’s reasonable that Mr. Duncan was likely already deceased by that point. Meaning that Darrin Wade killed off her entire remaining family, but she didn’t go hard vigilante (like Manticore) and instead redoubled her efforts to redeem her great uncle. Which is why I’m actually fairly okay with her stepping into granddad’s shoes because it’s actually in line with her Grandfather and mother’s ideals. For all the crap people give States, it’s worth remembering that his last act wasn’t to try and kill the man who murdered his only child, but to see him brought to justice and sent to prison. He was an inflexible jerk at times, but he walked the walk even when no one else could see him or would have even blamed him for ending Wade. So, as an alternative to resurrecting Statesman, I’d suggest instead that Ms. Liberty get a plot-relevant power-up and costume update (ageless or not, by the time you’re in your 40s, it’s time to lose the mini-skirt) and have her become Stateswoman. Heck, as an added sign of her re-commitment to redemption and second-chances Longbow could also retire its flamethrower units and upgrade the rifles/mini-guns to energy versions with an in-universe stun setting. The flamethrower units could be replaced with guys armed with the Plasmatic Taser AoE cone attack (as per the temp power).

An important point to note is that the one and only level bump happened just 62 days after launch and included new zones and new level 40+ mobs (Carnies, Malta, original recipe Praetorians) so it should NOT be considered some idea they hatched after the fact, but rather a part of the original plan that simply had delayed implementation. Given that basically the game's entire life minus two months was level 1-50 its pretty safe to say there were never plans to do continual level cap increases like all those other MMO's have done.

I'm going to go the opposite direction and say not only no to more levels, but also that, with hybrid, HC's version of the incarnate tree should be considered capped (i.e. adding more options to the six incarnate abilities is fine, adding new 1-50 sets and pools is encouraged, but adding more power picks, slots and incarnate power types is a no-go). Right now even a fully t4'd incarnate is effectively level 53 for incarnate content so level 54 opponents are still about the strength of a stronger opponent you'd face in a +0 difficulty mission (and even then, only in i-trials and Dark Astoria) and normal level 54 mobs with the right powers can still be a threat without actually needing to redo the game's core coding. With an all volunteer dev team it's going to be hard enough to just get new story content using the existing systems; expecting them to build all new systems and enough new content for 25-50 more levels would be downright sadistic.

One fun thought on that to reduce the need for new art assets; Part of the lore is that the Rikti dimension diverged because they encountered their dimension’s Battalion early. Their tech is all adapted from the Battalion’s and part of their re-shaping was using Battalion DNA and to adapt to “terraforming” (Battali-forming???) done by the Battalion to Rikti Earth. In other words; the Battalion could be presented as basically Rikti+. Do some palette-swapping on some of the rarer-seen Rikti units/maps (particularly the bigger and more impressive ones like Hro’dotz, Dra’gon and the heavy assault suits... which would be their version of the Rikti’s drones), add some alternate powers reflecting differences from taking a different path that didn’t lead them to Earth until now (I’m thinking Rad Blasts/Melee given that’s what their servants the Shivans have) and finally throw in some Neo-Shivans as underlings (akin to their Rikti monkeys) and you’ve got your Battalion. You’ve even got a good story hook that when they first show up in the skies everyone thinks it’s a new RIKTI invasion only for Vanguard to be blindsided by all the ways the Battalion are different and then when you go check in on the Rikti, they’re all panicking because they recognize the Battalion for what they are. At the same time, the familiarity with Rikti-tech also ends up giving Primal Earth ends up giving us an edge no other Earth had against their Battalion and our exploiting that is the key to victory (one interesting tidbit would be if the astronomical data you find hidden in General Loc’Danan’s armor during Twilight Son’s introductory mission ended up being related to the Battalion and one of the keys to actually beating them).

This is also the reason why I say the HC team should NOT feel beholden to the original team's ideas for future content. Personally, I'd rather the Coming Storm be a whole series of catastrophes akin to the Praetorian War and Mot happening right on top of each other and the Battalion are just normal invaders and the straw that can break the camel's back unless the Heroes stop things. No need to ramp up the power level with ever more incarnate slots; just too much going on for any one hero to actually deal with at once (good thing its an MMO).

Another random thought I had; in lieu of mez protection, if human and nova-form had the blaster’s ability to use their low tier attacks while mezzed it might be a reasonable compromise between the the usual all-or-nothing that mez protection grants (i.e. you’re either completely unaffected or fully affected) so that dwarf form still has a purpose (better mitigation, still able to move, more attacks) but lets human and nova still have some punch to them. The main gist of this post though is to suggest that the overall damage and defense scalars be looked at in light of the other ATs. I’m in the “feels like Master of None” camp and if the purpose of the AT is to be a adaptable generalist (i.e. a Jack of All Trades) then I’d suggest that the game already HAS an AT for that. Specifically, a Scrapper with one of the power sets that include 40’ ranged and cone attacks (ex. Claws and Kinetic Melee) and which have an epic pool (considered because PBs specifically don’t get them so their effects need to be baked into PB sets) with fast-recharging ranged attacks and a ranged AoE (ex. Blaze and Mu Mastery) can already do what a PB can do. Such a scrapper has a solid ranged attack chain... ex. Claws w. Mu Mastery can have Focus (40’ range), Shockwave (40’ cone), Mu Bolts (80’ range), Zapp (fast snipe), Electric Shackles (ranged hold+damage) and Ball Lightning (80’ targeted AoE). The same Scrapper can semi-tank with its defenses/mez protection, Confront and by aggro through sheer damage (including its fast recharging Spin PBAoE). And the Scrapper does both of those, plus a melee attack chain, without even needing any shape-shifting mechanics or needing to spread slots across 7 form attacks to enable those options. It also does this even without IOs or set bonuses. That is the baseline that PBs need to be compared with, particularly since they add so much complexity with the forms and slotting while trying to cover the same general areas. That’s also the reason I previously suggested that the best thing for PBs would be to create PB-based sets proliferated across the other ATs so you could build to taste since that‘s probably the only true way everyone could have their PB tailored to taste.

Yeah, that would be because, even though they appear disconnected, they actually have access to other zones via portals (which is technically all the trams/mission doors are too... just with fancier animations) Praetorian is coded as its own faction and neither hero nor villain for zone access. Until you go through the gateway to Primal Earth your flag isn’t flipped to allow you anywhere but Praetorian zones (I believe you can also go to Pocket D as one of the Night Ward missions even requires you to go there). I also know there are Resistance and Loyalist (along with hero and villain) contacts who hand out repeatable missions inside the First Ward main compound. I took advantage of those to smooth out my Praetorian leveling since I wasn’t using double XP (which I skip in 1-20 Praetoria because its already stupid easy to outlevel contacts and then forgot to charge up on before I hit First Ward and by the time I remembered I was 36 and most of the way through Night Ward anyway).

I could settle for the level 1 contacts with the proviso that they never expire due to leveling, but will instead introduce you to a level appropriate contact of they’re type (Azuria, for example; which I keep referencing because she’s the most familiar of the level 1 contacts due to actually showing up in later arcs; would introduce you to whichever magic contact is in your level range when you speak with her). Heck, I’d even be okay with only getting the contact that matched your origin initially just like it was on live before the Freedom/nuking Galaxy City revamp. Generally each of the original contacts will introduce you to one lateral contact (one in their same level band) and whichever one is next along that contact chain (the next magic, next tech, next mutant, etc.) so you’d fill out your list fairly quickly. It’s primarily the Freedom Tutorial and associated Atlas missions that short circuit the start of the default contact system. I do still stand by my “needless detective clutter” and “for God’s sake, have the SSA contacts introduce the next in the chain so you don’t have to guess or go to an external Wiki just to figure out the proper order for them” suggestions though.

One of the main things I’d like to see is purely cosmetic, but I’d REALLY like a minimum FX option for the forms. Human-form animations for the form attacks already exist and can be viewed in the power customization tabs so it’s mainly a matter of just turning off the squid and lobster. The character shifts focus, strengths and weaknesses, but remains in human forms (maybe with an aura if there HAS to something indicating their form). I would find changing forms for combat a LOT less annoying if I could actually see the awesome costume my PB is wearing instead of the same squid and lobster every other Kheld has. It’d also be a way to take full advantage of the tri-form build while presenting as a human-only or bi-form Kheld; eliminating an entire axis of balancing complexity (i.e. not only does a PB need to be balanced with other classes, each of the four options; human-only, nova-bi-form, dwarf-by-form or tri-form; also needs to balanced). I mentioned this elsewhere too, but I think part of the issues could be “solved” by creating some “Luminous/Umbral” sets (blast, melee, armor, manipulation, assault, etc.) for the other ATs. If you could could create a Luminous Armor/Melee Tanker, it could be balanced cleanly with all the other tankers even if it had the dwarf form as one of its powers (akin to Granite Armor’s complete model swap) because its ONLY a tank. The same would go for a Luminous Blast/Manipulation Blaster or an Umbral Control/Assault Dominator. I sometimes think the PB suffers from the same problem as the D&D Bard; by trying to be too many things at once it can’t be the best at anything without being too powerful. What finally fixed the Bard was that D&D finally picked a lane where they could shine (party buffing in its case). I think what will finally fix the PB is similarly, picking another AT you want it to be most like in terms of purpose and then use the forms to tweak the base to the two extremes of damage vs. resistance within that framework. For example; lets say you pick the Scrapper as your baseline; high damage and moderate defenses. Nova form puts you at the high damage side of scrapper sets, but at the bottom of its armor sets, dwarf puts you at the top tier for scrapper armor, but the bottom tier for damage. You could instead make its baseline the brute, the blaster or the sentinel (if that could ever figure out what it was supposed to be), but the operative part would be to pick one thing for the PB and the WS to be good at and balance around it. Personally I’d go Scrapper-ish for the PB (the most jack-of-all-stats of the original hero classes) and Dominator for the WS. Nova-form would buff your damage set and debuff your armor/control set while dwarf form does the opposite. This might mean that human-form PB ranged attacks would have to go back to their original 40’ range to match the scrapper’s ranged attacks, but would gain the scrapper’s damage scale and mez protection. Nova-form would buff the range, but scale back the defenses and mez protection. Dwarf-form would only use melee range attacks, but put you on the beefier side of scrapper defenses. But those are just my thoughts and the biggest problem is there’s probably no one solution that would please everyone in terms of fixing the PB proper. So I think I’ll close with the idea of, instead of fixing the PB proper, proliferate parts of its sets out to the other ATs so the one who wants a PB tank can roll a tank with PB powersets and the one who wants a PB blaster can roll a blaster with PB power sets and the one who wants the PB just as it is with a few tweaks can roll a normal PB. Just include a switch in the PB sets so if you take one you get Sunstorm as a contact and trigger quantum gunners and they’re all PBs of sorts.

Well, I dunno if it’ll help, but I’ve never encountered the memory leak you mentioned. Perhaps something in the difference between the two systems might reveal a starting point for fixing it? I’m not the most tech savvy guy out there (I basically just follow provided instructions when I encounter a problem) so I dunno what the HC team would need from me (or if it’s even a problem on HCs end or if it’s just some weird hardware/software interaction), but I’m game to take some time to help a fellow player get a problem like that fixed if I can be given instructions on how to do so.

I mentioned this in another thread, but since I’ve been back I’ve noticed the complete hash that has been made of the contacts system. To be fair, most of that was a result of the live devs wanting to their best foot forward (and to push the contacts whose mission chains served as ads for various paid power sets/costumes), but it’s still a huge mess of pop-ups and the find contact button isn’t super obvious, skips a bunch of older contacts and, especially with First/Night Ward offers you contacts out of order to the story arcs in those zones. Then, in terms of experiencing a sequential story, several arcs are pushed in the pop-ups before the preceding events are even available. The numbering in Oroboros helps, but Oroboros doesn’t make up for the default contact system being a mess. Related to that is, particularly for lower level contacts, it’s super-easy to just sail right past their 5 level band. So, here is what I’d propose; 1) Give all the contacts cell-phones to start: Its the 2020s and talking with heroes over a phone or dedicated comms is far safer than standing out on some street corner waiting for a hero to happen by. The paranoid ones would just be using burner phones. The result is you can initially get in touch with a contact from anywhere and decide if you want to pursue their missions. 2) Include a standard date system with the contact name: Ex. Azuria (issue 0), Penelope Yin (issue 8). This would help clear-up when a given contact’s missions occur in a way that’s harder to miss than the pop-up contacts. Optional: If a contact deals particularly with enemy groups of a certain origin (ex. magic or mutants) or theme (ex. Portal Corp) that might be included too (ex. Azuria - issue 0 magic or Maria Jenkins - issue 23 Praetoria). 3) Automatically introduce the first contact in a chain: Unless they’re part of a larger story chain automatic add all contacts in your level range (ex. Jim Temblor would be added at 15, but Penny would not because you have to finish Jim’s story first for the larger arc). By level 10 contacts are already mentioning having seen your exploits on the news, so if they have a problem/scheme they think you could help with, they’d be reaching out to you instead of the other way around. Coupled with number one, they’re just a call away if you decide to assist with their problem/aid in their scheme. [Side-bar: this would also help red-side with the feeling that you’re a lackey. It’s the difference between being interviewed for a job (pull enough missions to prove yourself to a broker who puts you in touch with someone who might need your skills) and being the one doing the interview (okay, your scheme is worth my time to get involved with).] 4) Expand the level range of the contact to the full range of the associated villain group/zone: Vahzilok go all the way to level 15 and the Clockwork to 20. There’s no reason to lock the contacts/missions introducing them to levels 1-5. I know that content is quite old, but having different routes to level up for different characters can help keep the game fresher than running the same content repeatedly. There’s also some really great lore attached to some of those early missions that people rarely even see unless they go looking for it. I went out of my way to talk to Azuria first thing recently and, as a result, got the right contacts to actually do the Spleunker badge mission as part of a normal mission chain. But I had to actively seek that content out rather than having it handed to me. It’d be a lot easier if Azuria and the other magic origin contacts were willing to talk to you for the entire level range that you can find Hellions to hunt. Likewise, Faultline is a level 15-25 zone and the Lost, Sky Raiders and Arachnos cover that entire range. There’s no reason Jim Temblor should be cut off as a contact at level 20. Oroboros should be the option of last resort for doing missed content and a way to replay old content; not the most efficient way to find story arcs for the first time. On the flip-side, because of City of Villains, the Carnies now have mobs all the way down to level 30. Other than Caedo Kestral’s involvement in her arc there’s no reason Madeline Casey’s arc needs to occur only during levels 40-45. It could instead be available in the full 30-50 band the Carnies are available for (with Harvey Maylor unlocked immediately afterwards). 5) Consolidate the Police Radio/Broker Contacts: Batman’s police contact was Commissioner Gordon (and occasionally Bullock and a few others), not half the Gotham Police Force. The actual contacts are functionally interchangeable with the zone they’re in mattering only in the sense that your level determines which zones you can get missions in and where the door for the Mayhem/Safeguard missions are. So have whichever police contact/broker you speak to first become your default contact and attach then to the police radio/newspaper so you don’t need a separate tab just to track your detectives/brokers. This cuts the contact tabs down to just three; active, inactive and tips. I’d also suggest that the order be changed to active, tips and then inactive and, if feasible, add an option to disable the inactive tab to further reduce clutter. If I could figure out a way to cleanly put tips on the main tab, I’d say do that too, but at least removing all the needless duplication of police detective contacts would help somewhat with the clutter. 6) Consolidate the SSA’s so the contacts naturally introduce you to the next in their chain of missions: Half the hassle with the SSA’s is knowing which contact goes with which of the two arcs and in which order. If you have to pull up the Paragon wiki just to run a story in order, It’s a problem. * * * * There is SO much content in City of Heroes that could provide different areas to explore that often just goes missing until you find some of it via Oroboros (example; there’s a VERY early clockwork mission where you actually find the Clockwork King’s mortal remains with the skull cut open to remove the brain... very creepy and really helps set the stage for later Clockwork content). It doesn’t have to be my suggestions as laid out above, but some level of housekeeping on how contacts get handed out is something I feel would really help out the play experience.