stryve

That tripped me up Respecing my Psi/Regen Scrapper as well. Dull Pain was converted to Second Wind, and moved the T8 position. Revive was converted to Ailment Resistance, and moved to the T4 position. Second Wind functions mostly the same as Dull Pain, except it also is a Rez and gives slightly less MaxHP. It also will auto-rez if you go down while it is active. Ailment Resistance is an Auto power that provides MaxHP, various DeBuff Resistance, and decreases your resistance to Healing (making Healing more effective). After I respecced, Ailment Resistance was enough to get me to the Scrapper HP when combined with the +MaxHP Accolades. This let me one-slot Second Wind as a Rez/Emergency Unresistable Heal.

Don't forget Ailment Resistance and Second Wind will swap places as to available level.

I am somewhat confused as to what this section means. Especially the fourth bullet point with Psionic Armor.

Ran another set of tests with purpose-created toons. All using War Mace/Stone Armor, slotted with standard level 50 IOs (no set IOs), with no Incarnates and no Inspirations. War mace because it has a wide cone, a narrow cone, and a PBAoE. Stone Armor for the damage/debuff aura, general effectiveness, and similarities across all three ATs (disregarding the T9, which I did not take). Only differences in power choice or slotting were Scrapper Confront (Taunt on Brute & Tanker) and Brute Superior Conditioning from Energy Mastery (Conserve Power on Scrapper & Tanker). All tests run at -1/x8 to ensure maximum enemy group size without overwhelming non-set defensive values (the Scrapper in particular could not reliably survive +0/x8 groups). Three runs with each AT using Galaxy Brain's Office Mission Simulator. Average Times AT Time Scrapper 10:53 Brute 8:12 Tanker 9:24 The Scrappers lower toughness hurt it more than runners here. The Immobilize and Slow field from Mud Pots helped mitigate against runners, but even without I think the four defeats over three runs would have totaled more time taken. Also may have just been bad RNG with spawns, as both the Brute and Tanker saw multiple spawns with no Bosses each run, while I can't remember any without at least two Bosses for the Scrapper. The Brute went down once, while the Tanker was rarely threatened. Better builds and/or players may see different results. In retrospect, War Mace may not have been the best choice, since Crowd Control has a 10 target cap on Brutes and Scrappers, while Shatter has a cap of 5 on all ATs. Also, the End usage was pretty harsh across all ATs.

Personally, I like patch holds, at least as they are currently implemented on Live (Dark, Earth, Arsenal). I even prefer Location AoE over Targeted AoE for such patches, though I am aware this is a contentious opinion. I also feel that Gravity in particular is well suited to leveraging the advantages of a patch Hold. Really, I only have a few complaints about the new patch holds as presented in RC1, and the last isn't actually about the new patches at all. Something about the transition to "True Pseudo-Pets" is causing issues not seen with existing patch Holds on Live, which is definitely problematic. If this can't be resolved, I would support shifting to Adaptive Recharge for the new patches and leaving existing patches as they are on Live. I prefer the flexibility offered by Location AoEs over the convenience of Targeted AoEs, at least for Mez patches. Given the choice, I would take a 180 second base recharge over the initial 16 target Hold. But then, I've long thought 240 seconds base (or max, with Adaptive Recharge) is excessive for AoE Holds. What do they offer that warrants such a massive increase compared to a Blast Set T9 with almost the same Mez plus massive damage on a 125, 145, or 170 second base recharge? I am annoyed that 4 of the seven Arsenal powers that interact with Containment are being reduced from 100% to 33% chance of triggering Containment. I understand that this is probably to bring all pets and pseudo-pets into alignment with the changes this Page, but it's still aggravating.

Ok, ran through the Tankers I have rough analogues of on other ATs. All tests performed using Galaxy Brain's Office Mission Simulator at +4/x8. All toons adjusted to have Musculature Radial Alpha, Reactive Core Interface, and Assault Hybrid. No active usage of Incarnates. I did use Blue Inspirations when I screwed up and ran myself out of Endurance a few times, but none aside from that. Character AT Time Ice/Stone Brute 7:52 Ice/Ice Scrapper 9:21 Ice/Ice Tanker 11:40 Shield/Kin Tanker 16:54 Kin/Willpower Scrapper 10:53 SR/MA Tanker 14:55 MA/SR Scrapper 9:24 First, I wasn't expecting that particular Brute to do so well. Guessing it's a combination of Brute Punchvoke keeping things grouped well, Stone Armor being better than Ice Armor for damage, and a just plain better build than the Scrapper or Tanker. Second, these runs just cemented my previous conclusion about melee cones: anything less than a 120° arc isn't going to get much value out of higher target caps without aggressive re-positioning for better angles once a fight starts. Ice Melee's Frost actually has a cap of 10 on Scrappers & Brutes, but I still wasn't getting more than 5 most of the time. It also has a radius of 10ft on all ATs, so increased radius doesn't help much there. On the other hand, cones are part of my single target rotation on several of my Tankers, so I appreciate that damage hasn't been decreased. Third, lack of ability to hold aggro definitely hurts Scrapper times. I felt that the most on MA/SR, though it was still pretty noticeable on Ice/Ice, with Kin/Will being the best. At least as far as having to chase runners goes. Fourth, the damage decrease for PBAoEs is very noticeable, especially with sets that don't have cones or damage auras to lean on. My SR Scrapper and Tanker in particular have builds about as close as can be between those ATs, with identical attack chains. Some of the difference in time is down to Scrappers being better at clearing hard targets like Bosses and EBs, but just mopping up the Minions and Lieutenants was notably slower on the Tanker, despite having to chase down runners on the Scrapper. Tanker Kinetic Melee's Burst does solidly more damage per target than Repulsing Torrent on Live but significantly less on Beta, as well. There's a point after which it is faster to do more damage to fewer targets than lower damage to more targets, and the proposed Tanker AoE changes are well past that. Lastly, since all of these are full builds from Live, there's a fair bit of variance just from set bonuses and differing power choices. There might be value in testing otherwise identical SO builds across multiple ATs just to reduce variables, though that would have to be run lower than +4/x8. Don't know if I'll be able to work up the energy to do it myself, unfortunately.

Have some extra time today, so I've been trying out my Tankers in Galaxy Brain's Office Mission Simulator. Nothing valid as a comparative test yet, mostly just familiarizing myself with the mission (so I don't was time hunting for a missed group) and re-familiarizing myself with a few toons I haven't been playing lately. My major initial impression is the performance differences between cone radius and arc. In general, I find arc is more important than radius for consistently hitting more targets in the middle of combat. I had a decent selection of cone sizes between Ice Melee, Dark Melee, Kinetic Melee, and Titan Weapons: Ice Melee - 10ft 90° Dark Melee - 7ft 120° Kinetic Melee - 40ft 45° Titan Weapons - 10ft 120° Even with a shorter reach, it was easier to hit 5 or more targets with Dark than Ice in the middle of combat. The extra reach wasn't useless, especially on approach, but even with active repositioning I was more likely to hit fewer than 5 targets with Ice. Titan Weapons had the best of both worlds, but still required active positioning to consistently hit more than 5 targets once mobs started moving. Kinetic Melee is an outlier in multiple ways, and requires jumping entirely out of a group to leverage the cone; I was lucky to get more than 2-3 hits while surrounded. These were all run at x8 to be clear. I'll try to run some more controlled tests later, with comparisons to Scrappers and Brutes.

There's also Tear Gas from Arsenal Control. I've used all three, and as far as actual control goes, new GDF is about the same. Pretty solid at locking down large groups, though the slight delay before initial pulse can let mobs react before freezing. Bosses and other mez resistant mobs may need a few pulses to stack Mag before being Held, which means they need to be kept within the field. Absolutely excels at long fights and any time multiple groups can be funneled through a specific area (pulls, ambushes, etc.). In terms of direct damage, none are great (Shadow Field doesn't actually do any damage at all). With GDF qualifying targets for Impact damage from other Gravity powers however (Lift, Propel, Lift from Singularity) , I'd say it comes out ahead. Gravity also has a built-in method of moving mobs directly with Wormhole, which is not present in Arsenal or Earth. The changes to Black Hole will give Dark a similar option, though the mechanics are different enough I don't know how the utility of each will stack up against the other. Finally, Singularity is amazing at grouping mobs and keeping them in one spot...at least until it randomly decides to flee. The new pet controls will give Controllers an advantage over Dominators there, but Teleport Target works decently at getting Singularity where you want it.

Finally got a chance to hop onto Brainstorm again this evening. Decided to run around SW Kallisti Warf for a bit, trying out various patches on 50+ groups. Sleep Grenade, Liquid Nitrogen, and Tear Gas are all still showing the same 33% Containment proc rate, unfortunately. So is Tri-Cannon, but that was expected since it's explicitly called out in the Controller Pets section. I did pay a little more attention to Tear Gas, as it occurred to me I'm not entirely sure what " set stacking to replace" means. Bosses that stayed in the cloud were Held after a pulse or two, so it's still stacking Mag. After thinking about things for a few days, the changes to pet/pseudo-pet Containment proc rate are probably to bring Arsenal in line with what other Control sets are getting in this Page, which is... understandable. I'm not particularly enthused about it though, especially in regards to Sleep Grenade (since the damage portion is a single burst on impact, rather than a continuing pulse like Liquid Nitrogen or Tear Gas). I'd much rather a higher percentage was used for proc rate across the board. It's not like even 100% would be breaking any DPS records.

Testing between Live and beta, I did notice a slight improvement in mobs falling back asleep after waking up in Sleep Grenade. I also appreciate the duration/recharge changes to Tear Gas, even if it comes with decrease of potential damage (16 ticks of 12.2 vs. 12 ticks of 17.75 with the same slotting). However, the "significant impact when combined with the new 3s rules for Controller Containment triggers after sleep is broken" mentioned in the Design Notes is really not in evidence. The reason for this is simple: of the seven powers in Arsenal that can trigger Containment, four now only have a 33% chance to do so. The only powers left are Tranquilizer, Cryo Freeze Ray, and Flash Bang. Two single target powers and an AoE Stun with low enough damage it's only worth mentioning for completions sake. I have tested on Beta while tracking Pet Combat, and the other four powers that can trigger Containment (Sleep Grenade, Liquid Nitrogen, Tear Gas, Tri-Cannon) are doing so about 33% of the time. On Live, all four are triggering Containment 100% of the time. Unless I'm missing something, the significant impact here is the massive reduction in Arsenal's ability to leverage Containment at all. Additionally, there's something odd going on with the Power Details in the Enhancement screen on Beta. Tranquilizer including Containment in Average Damage never was fixed after Arsenal went live, possibly something similar is happening with Sleep Grenade, Tear Gas, and Tri-Cannon on Beta? Liquid Nitrogen has always been off just because of how the power works, but it's even worse on Beta now. Here's a comparison of Average Damage as shown in Power Details on Live and Beta: Average Damage Power Live Beta Sleep Grenade 96.79 128.63 Liquid Nitrogen 476.55 953.91 Tear Gas 195.26 243.47 Tri-Cannon 178.84 357.45 And here's a comparison of Listed Damage as shown in Power Details on Live and Beta: Listed Damage Power Live Beta Sleep Grenade 1x96.79 1x96.72 Liquid Nitrogen 5x119.14 5x119.12 Tear Gas 12x17.75 16x12.2 Tri-Cannon 4x14.9 4x14.89 4x14.9 4x14.89 4x14.9 4x14.89 As can be seen, despite Listed Damage displaying as very slightly lower on Beta, Average Damage displays as significantly higher. I'm sure these are just due to the quirks in how Power Details calculates things, as has happened many times before. Finally, Liquid Nitrogen and Tri-Cannon have no mention of the current 33% chance for Containment, even if both very definitely have it.

Tried out Rime and the new Icy Bastion on my Ice/Savage Tanker (I do not have Hibernate on Live), since it was a themed build I've never been happy with. Max HP is lot lower without Hoarfrost, but ~1200 Absorb from Rime makes up for that quite well. Rime and Hoarfrost require about the same amount of total Recharge to make perma, which I managed to maintain through the Respec. The faster cycle time could be annoying if you don't like having to interrupt your attack chain that often, but much like Energize I consider it worth the click. I even managed to make use of the untouchable regen from Icy Bastion. Admittedly by accident (I forgot to double click), but it worked out pretty well. Barring major changes, I plan to respec this Tanker once the update hits Live. I also have an Ice/Ice Tanker and Scrapper that will stick with Hoarfrost, since I like where they are and don't want to juggle things around too much. Finally, I'll have to see how Rime does on my Energy/Ice Sentinel. I managed to make the set work on Live, but it took a lot of effort and I tend to agree with Heatstroke about Moisture Absorption (not to mention Frigid Shield).

I likely will not respec my Psi/Regen Scrapper for that reason. Pretty happy with how it is now, and testing with Ailment Resistance and Reactive Regeneration showed about the same performance. On the other hand, I do remember leveling him up, and Dull Pain's long recharge was very painful before I started getting things properly slotted. Finally finished comparative testing on my Rad/Regen Sentinel, as I was a little more methodical than with the Scrapper. This is an old toon, with a build that predates the major Sentinel rework, but he still does pretty well. Full T4 Incarnates, all four +End/Max HP Accolades, etc. Between power enhancement, Accolades, and set bonuses, Max HP is at the cap for the AT; Second Wind is slotted with a single Recharge Red and mostly used for Rez when I get overwhelmed. I was very worried about loosing the Absorb shield from Instant Regeneration (95.17 every 3 seconds, capping at 475.86), since it's great for soaking alpha and then giving some breathing room for general regen to work during a fight. Porting the toon over to Brainstorm with no build changes, the differences in Regen Rate and Debuff Resist are very apparent: Losing the Absorb hurt, but nearly doubling the resting Regen Rate makes up for a lot. To ensure an equivalent test on both sides, I ran the Welcome to Vanguard arc from Levantera in RWZ on both live and beta, escalating difficulty from +1/x6 to +4/x6 at the end. That arc has enough spawn density to easily get well over the agro cap shooting you, so x6 just means a few less bosses than x8. Overall, performance seemed pretty even between the two. Getting the attention of multiple groups at +4/x6 pushed me to the edge and kicked me over if I wasn't right on the ball, but that's what Second Wind is for. I was honestly expecting an experience closer to what Taoquex reported earlier in this thread, but it's just not what I saw. Now, a lot of that is probably down to build choices, as I have a fair bit of DEF and Resist from Pool Powers and set bonuses which with capped Max HP likely let me eat the alpha long enough for Reactive Regeneration to kick in. Pretty sure I saw my Regen Rate hit ~150 hp/sec at least once during the worst of it, though I unfortunately didn't think to grab another screenshot. Adding in Reconstruction and the occasional MoG was usually enough to keep me up long enough to reduce incoming fire. Overall impressions of the changes for a Sentinel: Trading Absorb for greatly increased Regen Rate works out about even. Decreased cast time for MoG is greatly appreciated; feels much smoother to activate, especially reactively. Adding +20% Debuff Resist to all categories may not seem like much, but it has a noticeable effect in practice and gives a better base to build from.

My two Regen toons are a Psi/Regen Scrapper and a Rad/Regen Sentinel. Dove into trying out the Scrapper right off, running PI radio missions. This toon has Dull pain perma on live and kept that with Second Wind on beta, but gets there with Ageless Radial (T4). He also has T4 Musculature Radial, but no other Incarnates yet. First batch of missions were all Carnies, so I decided it was fate and all testing was done with Carnies. Breezed through +1x6 and +2x6 with no issues. Increased to +3x8 and was just having to be a little careful... until I ran face first into a series of merged groups with 4-6 bosses between them, evenly split between Master Illusionist and Dark Mistress. That many debuffs dropped me real fast, plus all the Phantasms started overwhelming my KB Protection. Faceplanted a bunch (Second Wind's auto-rez was working just fine) before I started retreating to recover and string them out. Instant Healing and Reconstruction just weren't enough to keep me up otherwise. After the first group I respeced into Reactive Regeneration to see if it would make a difference, but the end result was about the same. Which is really an improvement for consistency, since I was seeing about the same performance with a toggle as with a long-recharge self-buff click. Then I decided to compare performance with live. Turns out I can still mostly manage +3x8 Carnies, but just 2 bosses in a regular sized group are likely to take me out. Overall, the increases to Debuff Resistance was very noticeable between beta and Live. The Carnie defeat power barely moved my blue bar on beta, but I still had to keep an eye on it on live. Ageless Radial caries a lot of weight there for both, but even then the higher floor made a big difference on beta.

As I said, not a huge issue. But it is an issue I've had with Temporal Bomb from Traps, and I really like Temporal Bomb. Additionally, being Rooted/Immobilized until you cancel the toggle is annoying. Back to the Tanker/Brute side of things, I have an Ice/Savage I've never been entirely happy with. I'll be trying out Rime and Icy Bastion eventually, but it's not at the top of the list yet.

From the other side (Scrappers and Sentinels), the double click is a minor annoyance. I do worry about failing to double click in the middle of combat. Could happen due to player forgetting, clicking another power too soon, or the system just not registering the second click.