Sir Myshkin

I used to moderately RP on Retail with a group and an SG I lead with a storyline and everything, and only casually stayed in character when a PUG was fully on board (no OOC). When coming back here I didn’t know what to expect (and moved to Everlasting when it opened out of pure coincidence before it became the “RP server”). I decided to start an SG which I’d planned on turning into more than just my own collective hub and determined it would be a place for characters who’ve become self aware. Called it the “Cult of the Leaked Code” a home for characters who praise and worship the “source code” that gives them life and see their players as benevolent beings. In a sense I play each character to their design, but their knowledge of being “piloted” means they may occasionally say something out of their control (ooc) which allows me to be lazy, oddly break dimensional barriers, and still have fun with each character without caring about “rules.” 😉 Im basically playing a stable full of Deadpool/BugsBunny who reverse fourth wall break themselves all the time!

If I recall the source correctly there was commentary in Netflix’s Jessica Jones about this. Jones had the ability to “leap tall buildings” yet chose not to because it tended to end badly for specifically the quoted reasons.

What happens when an immovable object meets an unstoppable force? It surrenders. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

Okay, being the glutton for punishment I am I skipped over to Croatoa with my TW/Regen Scrapper and loaded up ye-ol'ITF and struck up a conversation with the patrons within. They kicked me out. Repeatedly. It was so rude. I knew going in I needed to get a different rhythm down for my attack cycle so a couple of forays (repeats) into the ancient caves was expected, but even after I got myself mentally refocused on keeping up SM > MoG > SM > IH with Defensive Sweep mixed in, all it took was one side way glance from an angry drunkard (Boss) to ruin the good time and bring a bar-room's worth of angry Cims bearing down on me. I know in a one to one match with Requiem or Romulus I'm good, I've pulled each of them separate from a team during different ITF's and can take either down in a swift and judicial hurry, but the waves of angry men in skirts ... even just the single tick delay of Defensive Sweep not immediately syncing after the attack connected was enough of a window to suddenly find myself -30% and dead in the dirt. After a dozen tries and getting nearly out of M1's caves and into the light above, one server tick hang up had me face planted. Their bonus damage handily out paced 177 HP/s. I decided, at that point (and a small break) I was going to try something wildly different and loaded back to my character select screen and loaded up one particular character that has a tendency to lean a bit on the Mad side of things. As a sample of what is to come. I'll be revisiting this one as my first run got short changed by an unexpected turn of events. Flew up the back side of the altar and sniped the Minotaur (and gang) to the back. After a tad bit the Minotaur was all that was left but it kept running around like a headless chicken up and down the mountain, falling off and then running back up the front way. Eventually it took a rogue Tornado with it which waltzed right into a spawn of Cimmies and brought them marching back to me unplanned. I fell off the back of the mountain myself at this point and misclicked my base port macro which yanked me out of the mission. When I reloaded and ran through to get outside again the entire horde of Kheldian Nightmares sat waiting for me. Yay. I didn't even invite them to the party. It had taken me nearly 45 minutes to get to that point and just didn't have the time to revisit it, but knowing that it's doable has my encouraged to try it again, but it is a super-tentative process that is very chaotic. I took a few minutes of footage to pull the clip-gif above just to show that unlike many others, this particular lunatic is taking on the entire map at once. For those who might be unfamiliar, that is Mission 1 at the junction which includes a few Sybils to rescue and just after that bend it has another cross junction that leads up (and out, left), into a dead-end (right), and on to the remaining Sybils (forward). I was getting aggro from both the spawns just inside that passage, as well as the left and right rooms. I have two Scrappers who can't handle one single spawn of this Buffed ITF, yet my Mad King (Storm/En) can handily punch the whole thing in the face and laugh about it. Go figure. I also want to point out (for the record) that this character is only equipped with T3 Interface, Judgement, and Clarion, T1 Lore, and a T1 Support Hybrid (which was just to see if the passive would be worth any additional end management). Oh, and the Alpha is a T4 Musculature. Other than the convenience of the single level shift, I'm not really reliant on my Incarnate abilities (and they're not entirely adding much to the fight). My only concern when I revisit this will be getting Rommy to sit in one spot and suffer my wrath.

First I have to ask what you’re pairing it with, just to clear the possibility of additional benefits. I want to point out that Kinetic Melee doesn’t have the utility to add procs like Achilles’ that many other sets find a way to sneak in. Folks tend to forget that the real raw DPS of a set, and the enhanced values attributed from debuffs are two different things. There are not many sets that can walk up to something like a Pylon/AV and obliterate it from pure damage at speed. Get someone to toss a 20-40% -Res debuff on the pylon to simulate a couple of slotted -Res procs and see what happens.

For the record Kinetic Melee falls lower on standardized testing because Burst is a long animation with subpar damage, and the Cone has to be corrected for KB. From a ST perspective it shines tremendously which is why it excels on Stalkers (and the ability to critical Burst out of Hide). KM is capable* of stripping aggro off a Tanker with DPS alone. Back when I had a KM/SR I used to make it a point to try and output as much damage as possible to pull aggro for pure threat by DPS. I could easily jump into a BAF and go full red ring within a few seconds of fighting Siege despite any number of engaged Tankers or Brutes. *The Gauntlet improvements may have reduced the ease of that task, I don’t really have a ludicrous DPS character anymore to test that on that isn’t a Tanker. Particularly looking at BAF.

Assuming that was the right door (looked like it), being present at the door doesn’t prevent the ambushes as there are some groups that camp the door with Rommy and I’ve tried camping there myself. Given that, I have no clue how you avoided the ambushes. Oh man, I can’t believe I completely forgot that Titan Weapons has this ability, that massively changes my thought process with my TW/Regen. Yes, that’s right, I’m considering running the challenge with a Regen. >_>

Office Notice To: All Re: Mez, Faceplanting, Performance Metrics Please review category specialist "Mad King", subsection 8 (Defender), paragraphs 1 - 4, footnote v3.0 Term review, "Spawn Collection" Footnote: "Can't mez you if they're dead or on the floor dying."

Piggyback on this by saying that it is safer to generally assume Mid's is wrong on proc damage calculations no matter what because its probability formula (currently, as I don't believe any corrective patch has changed it yet) does not correctly account all variables in the right manner. There are many (potentially all, just less apparent) abilities that are attributing some aspects of global recharge in their calculations when they should not. The probability math is better served by hand at the moment (if one really wants to know). Specifically in regards to the concern with Auras, those are cycling at a rather low probability in a 10/s pulse which is why Mid's shows such a low value (2-8 damage depending) average. Again, safer to not rely on the probability calculations to understand what's going on from a damage perspective. In AoE effects that damage is going towards specific enemies that rolled for the proc, not the entire group thus making it effectually inaccurate as a collective form of damage.

Well so far we've had a pretty good [Tanker] selection tackle this with Rad, Dark, SR, and Invuln. Willpower might be the only set that I'd be a tad apprehensive on saying "Yes, it'll be fine" since it's fully invested in RttC for healing and that might be a counter-productive struggle for that set. So far the general (and earnest) challenge has really come down to finding a Scrapper capable of dealing with the extra bursty damage with only 75% Cap.

I'm going to continue looking at this falling sky from the perspective of "If I don't have to change my slotting, and my attack chain still works, then frankly I don't care what happens to it." I suspect many will probably (ultimately) fall into this category.

Toying around with this the last couple of nights. I only have two Scrappers in my stable TW/Regen and Rad/DA, been looking at possibilities to tackle this on either one. Ran some Buffed ITF's with both to see how they'd fair running into mobs randomly, get a feel for things ahead of time. Decided to give the Rad/DA an earnest shot solo this evening because I felt like he'd have a better shot, and I just can't crack getting swarmed. I know I can "accomplish" the MoITF, but to do it feels like I'm cheating and it'd take a very long time to get through it, and that method is just small-group pulling things apart and killing them in chunks. If I get more than five or six of the Cimmies on me at once, the debuff and the bigger hits take me down in a heart beat. Even at 75% Resists I'm still going down like an ice cube in a volcano once they clear my defenses (45% S/L/Melee plus Shadow Meld on tap). I cleared the first mission pulling apart until I snagged a bit too much right at the end and got overwhelmed and floored. I want to believe the second mission would be smoother sailing, but that one ends up being primarily ranged blasts from the Squids and Fluffies, so my Defense doesn't mean much of anything there. I'm boiling things down to being only feasible from either a Shield, Invuln, or maybe an Energy that can pack some extra resists in. I don't really want to roll a character specifically just to meet this challenge, but it does bug me a bit (and I don't really know why). Thinking Mace/SD to get some extra damage in there, Tough Grit earns some extra HP and the Accolades get it close to HP cap. Maybe I'll just roll it on Beta and try it there, but that feels a bit hollow in my mind.

As someone who has been leading a lot of Tin Mage and Apex TF's every night for the last few weeks I've had the chance to see a lot of transitional characters, and when you're throwing a timer on every run the variances can be pretty striking. I have had teams that were all T3 or better for every Incarnate, had a few T4'd with a few barely-Alpha'd, even a string of purely Alpha-only and myself being the only T3/4 across the board. I have seen Apex and Tin Mage both completed in 11 minutes and change each, and also take nearly 25 minutes for either, but the consistent is typically 14-16 minutes, about 30 minutes for the whole thing. Where does the time go up? When it is all Melee/Blasters with middling builds and a mix of Incarnate parts (or next to none). If I take that same team dynamic and replace any one random character with a Support role that has a solid debuff (Cold, Thermal, Rad, TA, Dark, Poison), and that dial pretty instantly snaps back. How do the low time runs occur? A lot of T4 present, everyone carrying a T3 Lore or better, and at least two strong debuffers backed by two or three high DPS, High-Spec builds. The weak points in those runs are the EB/AV targets, and how efficiently crowd-clearing can occur. The PPD station ambush is the longest aspect of the entire thing because it's triggered events reliant on how fast the team can bend through those spawn points. More folk with T3/4 Judgements to insta-clear spawns, and debuffers that make it possible to liquefy the War Walkers fast (I'm talking seconds fast). Support roles (and I'm more specifically talking their Buff/Debuff side of the equation) are still relevant, but their presence is altering the dynamic of the game at a level that becomes harder to see. Much like taking down a Pylon--as an example--the more aggressive the debuff/damage output of the character becomes, the shorter the time, but what doesn't get seen until the numbers are crunched is how radically different the times are from a DPS standpoint. Once a single character gets into the sub 3:00 time, small errors can mean major changes, and once a build gets into the 1:30 or less range, even just two seconds worth of a player's mistake can mean 10+ seconds of error on the kill timer. Something that might have 300 DPS and take a Pylon down in 4:00 minutes, doubling the DPS suddenly breaks the build into the 1:00-1:30 category, a quarter of the time (not exact numbers, just a relative example of the way it really is). Take that Pylon conditioning concept into an Incarnate trial or Incarnate TF and look at those two or three characters that can kill an AV in a couple of minutes each, we amp up the AV's level and defenses for the content but they'll still take it down in a few minutes. Toss a a Support role in there with a Debuff and we shave a 3:00 time down to 2:00, does it feel like the Support role had a hand in that? No, it absolutely does not, but the truth of it is... well yes, they did, but we're all collectively moving at a speed that's so insanely quick as-is that it has become much harder to separate the difference unless you're statistically looking for it.

As it was asked for source on the matter of DOOM^TM: A bit down in the post there's a note specifically about reworking Titan Weapons specifically "in the near future." We've gone from "we'll be looking at this" to "it's happening."

Actually the Power Transfer proc is 3PPM which is actually above the average for procs of this nature (comparing to things like Gaussian's, Decimation, Force Feedback, among a few others), and is the same PPM rate as the Panacea. I took a 60/s snapshot off my Tanker just now: To contrast what the PT+Heal is doing from a build-perspective, a player would need to add at least 50% Regen into their build to accommodate what this one proc is doing, and on top of that if it were partnered with the End Mod piece in Stamina, the set bonus is an additional (actual) 6% Regen. It would be no different than loading a damage proc into an attack as those tend to be 3 or 3.5 PPM (Excluding Purple/Catalyzed stuff). The contrast is only in the fact that typical proc-slotting is under the guise of getting at least an average of one damage proc per activation by loading up 3-4 in a power, so we'd have to look at PT+Heal more from a "how many attacks is it in I can cycle" instead, and weight out activations per chain cycle. Unfortunately only Electrical based sets really get to play around with that though. Not saying I would personally go the mileage to committing the proc in all of my attacks to leverage it, but then again I ... have a love/hate relationship with Electrical Blast. I want to love it, but I end up hating it, and trying to squeeze the proc in ruins too many of my regrettably needed set bonuses. Anyway, my point is that if I could squeeze it in a few extra places under Auto powers, I 100% would, but the limiter on it makes the addition less worth wild. If I didn't have that restriction, and packed four in? 1,124.4 in heals every 60/s. I have an average-accumulated HP bonus on my Tanker that puts him at 2298... that's 49% of my HP refilled for free. In Regen terms that's like 240%. That's broken, and that's why it has a limiter on it. Even still, I'd say it's worth using one in Stamina, so much so I've replaced my typical slotting of Perf.Shifter+End with PT+Heal. PT+Pana is 600 HP in free heals a minute, and that's definitely not something to sneeze at.

Let’s just call it a feature of Homecoming 😉

Specifically talking about the Power Transfer chance for Heal proc which is scaled off HP, and is not limited to the “rule of 5” because it isn’t a set bonus, it is just a static proc. It also doesn’t do well to try and break that down into an HP/s calculation because it becomes burst healing and if we start multiplying that even just four times we’re getting potentially over 200 HP in a heal every 10/s with just four in place, that’s like having an unslotted Healing Aura going off for free. That’s pretty broken. As for sets that have access to multiple options for that... Any Brute, Tanker, Blaster... Regen and Willpower Scrapper/Stalkers, the entirety of Electrical Affinity, the Electrical Control toggle... Static Conduction or whatever it’s called, Lightning Field... any end mod inclusive AoE/Cone (that would just get ridiculous). The restriction on the proc makes sense, the ability to do broken things with it is too egregious otherwise.

Essentially you're buying time with the XP Booster, and you can purchase up to 8 hours of in-game time with them. You should be able to get all the way into 28-30 off casual play on that initial 8 hours stack. On a good scenario I've managed to get to 40 with a lot of high-paced teams and some Weekly TF extreme xp bonuses.

I can’t say this wasn’t partially my consideration that it is a system that could reasonably function as another “storage” option, even if the character never participated in the event, their funds would be “in the pot” making the value of the approach even better, but there needs to be a risk factor, something that ultimately acts as the “sink” part of the equation.

As others have said, and to which I agree, storing and holding C/UC salvage is generally not worth the space as they’re cheap and easily obtained for little cost. For Rare salvage what I would suggest be a rule of thumb is that if the piece in need is not in storage, find a piece that’s got the highest stored volume and sell one off to fund/offset the needed piece. This will help manage the inventory being used and make sure unneeded salvage does not build up. If you’re running in to capacity issues over enhancements, same rule of thumb: keep the commonly needed items like a few end reduction, end mod, and recharge IOs, and then only focus on sets that are commonly popular and have a range that goes from 20-40 or 25-50 for maximum utility. Toss out all the other generally unwanted stuff, or create a bin or two of “junk” enhancements that people can use to frankenslot while leveling, but also have the rule be that if someone wants to use converters to lottery those pieces into better items than go for it.

I will say that I (personally) feel like the old style of casting your line out into broadcast or LFG is so easily dismissed even since Homecoming started up over a year ago. I’ve tried tossing out “AT level LFT” myself, especially during some peak times when folks are building teams, and nothing tends to come of it. The idea of grabbing those wayward souls is a bit lost. As MTeague said, the dynamic of things has shifted to the point where people just sit idly by waiting for someone else to put the team together for them, which leaves people having to make a decision of being that one that finally says “Oky, Team LFM” or continue subserviently waiting. Some part of me wants there to be a Master Class tutorial on team building so people can feel more comfortable. In recent weeks I have found myself starting up a specific nightly TF just to get a half hour to hour of play in each night without waiting around, and now there’s folks quite literally waiting for me to pop in next to the contact around that time frame, before I even log in. In fact I’d probably be running one right now if my ISP hadn’t crashed 20 minutes ago. Anyway, this is one of those things that you can fix yourself by simply making the team instead of waiting for it. Even if you’re low level and doing random contacts, people will join you and you might even be surprised to discover some of them are exempting down to tag along!

This would actually be a kind of interesting idea though, if it could be implemented. Players "deposit" funds into a bank vault, throughout a week period (say, Tuesday to Monday, with clearing done on server maintenance) robberies are weighed against successful saves. If more robberies occurred, the thieves will have successfully stolen funds from the bank accordingly, and receive their due. If more banks are saved, as a thank you to those protecting the financial well-being of Paragon will receive a reward. 1%* of total deposit will be "withheld" as a "bank fee", and will only incur at time of funds deposit Total deposit that can be made per character cannot exceed 1,500,000,000 For each successful robbery or save on a corresponding character, they will earn 0.10%* of the total grand (everyone's) deposit towards their theft or reward No character can earn a reward or steal a cut from the bank greater than their personal total deposit value Exception to this: If Robberies take the week, the top 5% of all thieves (those who committed the most bank robberies, exclusive to one character per player account) will receive a flat 1% bonus cut of the grand deposit, as is for Villains, they take because they do not have, and seek to be rewarded for their efforts in stealing from Paragon's elite by being the best of the worst! Payout for the reward, or the return of their cut, will be added to the character's deposit and roll forward towards the next week's values unless... Deposit holdings cannot exceed 2,000,000,000, and any amount may be withdrawn at any time. *subject to change based on how the math really rolls on that Edit: More to come on this, looking at some logistics.

Think of it like this: Two families go on vacation, both will be gone for seven days, both are going to the same highlight destination. Family A is driving, will have planned stops at sight-seeing points along the journey, and take three days to get there, spend one day at the highlight location, and take another route back over the next three visiting more places along the road home. Family B is flying directly to the destination and will spend the entire vacation there. They will spend more time doing social highlights and activities centralized around the destination before they finally fly home at the end of the seventh day. In the end both families can say they went to [Destination], and both will have stories about what they did, one will be focused more about their trip along the way, and the other’s will be about the fun they had there. Both will have had an enjoyable vacation, but from two different perspectives. While I myself don’t particularly seek to farm my characters and still typically level them up through play, the real game doesn’t start for me until they’re 50. The time playing with others is the experience I’m after, not the leveling process. I generally hate leveling and if I could insta-50 I’d do it in a heartbeat, as such I also dislike sitting in the same mission map over and over and over again to farm one up. There is a tremendous amount of freedom in being able to play anything with a character rather than be level locked because it hasn’t met some arbitrary point yet. I am a “Family B,” you are a “Family A.”

Short Answer: Yes Long Answer: You have a few key elements of anti-support in Trick Arrow like -ToHit, -Dam, which are effectively reverse Def and Res respectively, but not necessarily enough, and (currently) can be resisted. The biggest way you can support each character would be to get some defensive values into that 45% range (S/L/En). That alone will tremendously boost survival of each. Whether you do that with dual Maneuvers, the Fighting Pool, Scorpion Shield, set bonuses that’s your call and n those builds. Scorpion Shield will definitely be the easier choice to get there though. Also, I hear pray tell a buff may be coming to Trick Arrow per the announcement yesterday.

I would add a note about chasing Regen bonuses in that a lot of the places you can source them from are going to naturally accrue from standard choices across sets. The 6-12% regen bonuses exist in probably 50-60% of any set a Melee character can choose in a build, and the difference between what I’d typically get naturally versus a build chasing bonuses ended up to be only 10 HP/s difference. It just tends not to be worth chasing no matter which way it’s looked at. The biggest key thing for Regen is this, in order: Recharge Cap HP (This should be a “gimme” consequence of Recharge.) 32% S/L/Melee Defense —If 45% can be sanely achieved, this would obviously be the optimal choice, but it often comes with the sacrifice of Recharge. The way the PwrXfr +Heal works is 100% as designed. It does a trigger check each time and looks to see if any others are on the stack, nulls them and only fires one. This prevents egregious abuse of the proc for the several dozen power sets out there that have multiple access points to abuse it. Willpower, Regen, all the Blaster recovery toggles, Brutes/Tankers with Body Epic, etc.