Doomguide2005

End of my lunch break here, but I'll be back. Earth and Empathy are 2 of my favorite sets.

A few random thoughts. If you plan on primarily teaming, especially on larger teams focus on recharge for mitigation. Defense is fine and all but, Stalagmites is a relatively fast power. The animation is relatively longer and it roots you but it is only 0.733 seconds into the animation before the foes are hit by the stun. Earth has many patches you can drop from around the corner or under total cover where retaliation is impossible. Arctic Fog --> with a stealth IO or Super Speed and you are invisible to the majority of foes so you are almost always initiating the fight (or a teammate has chosen to) All your powers both Earth and Cold can be used at range including Heat Loss. You'll just benefit less from HL Sleet not only debuffs but has Avoid. They'll be running (slowly) out of the patch, not fighting you. The slow effect is substantial right out of the box no need to enhance especially when foes are also being effected by QS and/or SS as well, nevermind the rest of Earth's abundance of controls. This is why recharge is important, getting those cool downs shortened will do more to protect you than defense ever will. (Okay that might be slight hyperbole but not by much ... ) Indomitable Will --> mez protection essentially as good as any armor set. You can with very high levels of recharge make this perma (and I do mean high) but it is doable. You'll have an Immobilize 'hole' but CJ covers that. Benumb --> does have a to hit roll as pointed out above, but this one reason I like Tactics. Tactics, Kismet, Earth and Cold's defdebuffs plus the global accuracy you pick up going after recharge can go a long way towards saying you don't need accuracy in Benumb. You may or may not need to slot the power itself. My Cold/Ice did not but that was using defender Tactics etc.. Sleep calls for now.

@InvaderStych I'd go a step further even and say we want Diverse Teams in the sense of over multiple team compositions and not necessarily within the composition of an individual team. Everything from 8 Empaths or FRads to 8 entirely different ATs with everything in between included, all viable, even if each composition has varying degrees of success.

I like them as an interesting change of pace to the usual mission content. I dislike them for the reasons pointed out in the thread and would love to see some solutions implemented, some suggested above. Save by 'fixing' the vault so it closes or reinstates a protective force field around the item (maybe the force field is really an absorb shield and hence destructible but gives you time to return to handle an ambush). Maybe guards driven away return to their station(s) after your character drives off the supernatural threats. My friends and I would joke about wanting a burlap sack for those silly hostages you have to rescue so maybe your character takes possession (and if you get defeated you might lose the items with or without any chance to recover them in time to prevent defeat/mission failure). And probably another zillion variants on the general idea.

And you do benefit from doing it over and over. Eventually you can do it without purchase of the recipe, reduced cost, shiny badge(s) and portable workbench. So not quite what the OP envisions but there are benefits for 'becoming better' from repetition. And I for one appreciate the lack of necessity for what would essentially become grinding to get skills increased across a very large number of skills.

And my Claws/SR scrapper 😋 (And pretty much any other SR using AT). We ain't afraid of no defense debuffs (we're a Scrapper, we ain't afraid of nothin' ... till it's too late of course). Her favorite part is that damn autohit Nictus.

🤪 They've just suffered from being attacked by a foe who isn't several levels lower than them ... since Rommy is the same level, ouch, ouch, ouchie.

Hmmm, Dark Armor, Dark Miasma, Illusion Control, Mind Control, Mental Manipulation, Presence, Dark Melee, Darkness Manipulation, and Leviathan Mastery all have Fear causing powers. Pulled from the HCwiki and as the article is incomplete this list may be missing a few power sets --> such as Darkness Control which has several powers with a fear component (including Haunt and Umbra Beast) that I know about. Could be wickedly effective even as a small team. Silly amount of To Hit debuff potential resulting in a whiff fest after the foes are attacked and get one return attack to retaliate.

Lol 😆 Though to be fair a single AV vs 8 Controllers of any sort is already in serious trouble in terms of getting perma Held unless they've something above and beyond PToD vs holds to help them out. That's ~25 mag every 3 seconds or so just from their single target holds.

@Riverduskgot it in while I was typing 👍. Earth and Illusion both have something going for them that no other Controllers have. Their pets. More specifically pets whose attacks taunt their target. All of Stoney's attacks carry a mag 4 13.2 sec taunt in addition to their other effects and damage. PA again all attacks carry a mag 4 taunt some at 27.2 sec the rest at 26.66 sec. PA's decoy also has +500% threat modifier for 0.45 sec. I'm guessing the last is to grab attention as the decoy appears, while the rest (the attacks) keeps the attention focused on PA for the duration. Phantasm creates a decoyphantasm and its attacks carry a mag 4, 13.33 sec taunt (the phanty's decoy. Phantasm carries no taunt itself). That's why Illusion (often /RadEm) was solo veteran long before IOs even existed.

It was the only zone since I started playing (late i3) that my main was not the first to visit. Tried to zone in and the computer crashed leaving her in 'elsewhere' After several tries to log her in and support tickets I eventually logged in another ... and it rapidly became a favorite.

Well it is a 3.5 ppm proc so at minimum I would expect similar proc rates from damage procs with same value. Both Touch of Lady Grey and Shield Breaker have the same ppm value per CoD

Agreed 👍

One other thing not mentioned is Earth (Stoney) and Illusion (PA and Phant) pets are the only ones whose pets have Taunt built into their attacks. PA in particular is a long lasting taunt effect, but Stoney is no slouch either.

hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Exemplar_Effects_on_Enhancements This should take you to the HCWiki page dealing with the topic. It should be accurate on the material covered. It doesn't cover attunement as I recall. Step 3. Covers the actual scaling on the enhancements.

Well they aren't temporary but can be had from the p2w vendor. 1. Nemesis Staff 2. Okay don't know about that ... but then taunt is merely a modifier on threat so anyone can aggro a foe. 3. Sands of Mu 4. Hehe ... don't suppose Rest counts? And of course Healing and Rez powers are available Not to mention I've a hard time thinking of a TF where not having a specific power might stop a team in its tracks in a similar manner as this. And at least in the endgame there's this thing called alternate builds. My scrapper did exactly that on this very TF back on Live. We didn't lose our sole controller but I was using Petrifying Gaze, a mag 3 Hold with base duration a bit over 9 seconds courtesy of an alt build using Darkness Mastery. Stacking would be an issue but that's just me. Hopefully at least 6 teammates still left or finding a Hold might be the least of the problems. So while that would make things a tiny bit easier it is a rather minor request and there's plenty of fairly solid attacks already present at the p2w vendor and this is hardly game breaking.

Well I can safely say the concept existed as of issue 3. I can also safely say while the concept existed it had already expired and was headed out the door. It just has a way of saying goodbye like the friend everyone has who starts saying goodbye at 7pm and is still chatting away as the clock strikes midnight.

More like a meme specific to this game and its forums. Nobody is forcing any one to use it anymore than "in before a Red Name". Myself I just think the idea runs contrary to the intent behind the damage buff which was to boost defender damage when solo or on small teams and not as a all the time boost to their damage output. I do think the Vigilance needs a tweak or 10. But I'm at a loss to say how specifically partly because defenders are very potent in teams (i.e. how do you do something for an AT so utterly dominant in large groups that helps solo without making groups even more ridiculous) and also very a very functionally diverse AT with equally diverse playstyles. If Vigilance is applied as suggested then why are we talking about an inherent vs an increase in the AT's damage mods etc., etc.?

Caltrops doesn't need much. Slotting for damage here is a lot like doing so for AM. It'll make a small number a slightly larger small number. Its main use for me has been a stay away power, area denial. If it's running away it is not shooting at you as well. I also like to slot some range into it so I can use them at a range beyond 'just off my toes' distance. But that's all said as a Defender or Corruptor player of Traps not as a Controller. You have lots of other options that you don't have as those two ATs to keep mobs off you ... and with Fissure and Seismic Smash available less reason for it. Therefore I'd be looking to slot slow movement primarily. Targets running slowly away from you make for juicy targets for Fissure and Seismic Smash. And moving slowly in caltrops will by itself equal more damage as it keeps them in the field longer taking damage. Usually this meant I'd frankkenslot Range/Slow IOs in caltrops and that's probably still how I'd do it even though range is less useful ... options always are useful and you could still drop them at your feet. Well you do have Triage Beacon and I agree with @plainguyI like to be able to stack Beacons and the procs you're using there don't have their chance to proc altered by recharge in the power. They fire off on casting then every 10 secs thereafter 100% of the time. So yes I'd personally be willing to trade away Earth's Embrace for caltrops. On the otherhand I think this next thing exemplifies one big difference between a Traps Controller and a Defender or Corruptor. Namely the utility for having and using Seekers. I would not skip it in a Defender or Corruptor but you have all sorts of options to squash return fire from a mobs and doubly so with Plant as typically this means using Seeds on them as an opener so while I'd normally go on about its benefits of keeping and using them those benefits barely exist for a Plant Controller. If you can fit it in great, if not then it's not a big problem.

Only fun games become old games 😁

Is it a Banshee or is it Memorex (or the mating call of a distressed Humpback). You tell me.

Some random thoughts You can put a BotZ kb prot in Combat Teleport or Winter's Gift resist recharge or speed debuffs. Better while leveling, but will work in Earth's Embrace even with power grayed out. I wouldn't bother enhancing the damage in Acid Mortar. Enhancing trivial DoT is still trivial. Procs, at least on Live, were a far better way to get damage from AM. I'm definitely no proc expert but enhancing recharge in Poison Trap may reduce the chance of triggering the procs in it. In similar vein Numina's and Miracle are normally put in auto powers (or toggle that's always left on). You may only get the buff on casting the power. Normally those IOs only work upon casting a click power. That'll work as long as you recast TB every 120 sec or less. I'd offer more but I have a dead computer so no ability to use Mids at the moment, only internet is this phone.

You are correct, neither Psi or Toxic damage is helped out by SR's scaling resists. Mentioned that a bit further along in the same post. So yes a non-positional Psi or Toxic attack can get very painful, very quickly. Fortunately they are also very rare especially big hard hitting attacks of that nature. Ditto for anything causing Terrorize. I try to carry at least 1 breakfree type inspire just in case I run into a rude surprise. And this is a good place to note that SR has native Confuse protection, I've never been confused ... or it was so rare I don't recall it at all. I do know I've been Terrorized. You also can't be readily "Blinded".

Search GRETA-001. She's on Hopestar's Build archives for Scrappers.

It can be indeed. Bill Z can stack up to 3 Follow Up each boosting his damage and the last build I saw was pushing energy/neg energy resists up there for doing DA repeatables. Mine focused heavily into packing on +max health and regen which pushes her passive regen up around 32hp/sec backed by Rebirth she's very sturdy.