Galaxy Brain

A few others beat me to it, but the powers that just make you go on a time-out from playing are not fun. yes, you can prevent it but if they manage to pop it the 45 second wait is just boring.

It was fun as hell, but also really out of left field as a weird event. I'd love for more X factor things: "INCOMING SWARM!" "SUPER-CHARGED ENEMY INCOMING!" "THE NEBULIZER HAS BEEN USED TO DEBUFF YOU!" type of events that could mix up missions.

I think the fact that we have a ton of veteran players is a big factor. Combine that with the ease of access to lvl 50, to IO's, Incarnates, and they all mix together to make CoH quite breezy at times even when running the hard stuff. Hell, the last time I remember really eating dirt with my non-softcapped blaster was on a MLTF with Infinitum due to every bane spider in existence coalescing in one room! If it were a normal encounter with a normal amount of enemies it'd be a breeze. Something that @Infinitum and I have talked about though is that there definitely needs to be something new for us to chew on, and luckily we have the perfect place: The Shadow Shard Not only is this a criminally underused area of the game, but it includes a built-in means to have "Special Enemies" with the Reflections (https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Shadow_Shard_Reflections). Lore wise, the Shadow Shard has mirrored versions of a ton of existing enemy groups, given that this is a place of Dreams then it could feature remixed enemies that could expand to different tiers if we want: Reflection - basically a slightly tougher version of X enemy group. I would definitely allow low level enemies to reappear as lvl 50+ versions as reflections! Dream - one step up, granted new powers and abilities Nightmare - final step, totally bonkers abilities fitting their theme (Freakshow with a full suite of elec and claws powers, etc) We could fit it in as even Radio-Style missions in the shards where defeating these Reflections somehow weakens Rularuu, and like how every X radio missions gets you a safeguard, every X Dream-Missions grant you a shot at a thematic Shadow Shard encounter. On top of all that, basic Rularuu enemies are able to tear whole teams a new one lol.

On a second thought here.... is 4 min way too generous a cut-off? Edit: testing it out, it seems just sitting in the middle of the spawns (untargetable/invincible for pure offense testing) with Fire/Rad, just alternating Burn/Atom Smasher/Fiery Embrace/Build Up/+2 Damage Auras with basic slotting would take out all but the bosses in about 2 minutes on average at +4/x8. Given this is super minimal effort, we could assume maybe 2:30 / 3:00 would be a more reasonable "immortal" line in practice?

@SeraphimKensai, @golstat2003, Its probably surprising for sure lol, but I think it's just a neat idea for the enhancement side of things for a lot of powers. For example, an attack with a solid debuff or mez effect could now be opened up to slot for both sides at the cost of not being able to fully place a set. Sure, there may be a few no-brainers like Hasten... but then you gotta think about some other powers with longer recharges that may benefit more...

What I meant is that purposefully taking away from what the game leads you toward in any way is not a true solution. It'd be like playing Mario Sunshine without the Flood Backpack as much as possible. You can certainly do it, and it is making it harder for yourself, but it is not intended for you to do this.

With regards to others effecting your game experience, this is 100% a thing in this MMO. We have had several examples in this thread talking about different levels of being "left in the dust" by just general teaming, to the point of many feeling like they're just doorsitting. It should be assumed that the basic gameplay should be using the tools given to us when able. Actively choosing NOT to use said tools is going against the basics of the game and should not be a "viable" solution.

Real World Test 3: Malta Edit: Granite is 6min here as opposed to the 8 i gave it prior as though immortal, it was taking licks noticeably compared to council/etc.

Im thinking the latter where you can only have 1 purple damage, 1 purple end redux, etc. They would drop and be crafted the same way as purples.

Basically they'd be equal to 3 (level 50) IO's for the cost of 1, which would be roughly 100% or 60% enhancement after ED.

Problem is, missions are 99% the same enemies you'd find sweeping 😕

So, random thought came to me today: Generic Purple IO's The premise is simple, a Generic Purple will be a Unique IO (can't have 2 purple damages, or defense, etc) that is worth 100%/60% enhancement (depending on the schedule). Being purple tier, they still will be very rare to find, but can be a slotting boon for many builds. They are still subject to ED of course (if you slap a 100% recharge in a power, more recharge would be miniscule after), and take up a slot in your powers still when it comes to slot bonuses / etc. Thoughts?

I think for simplicity, KB should just do bonus damage based on the applied magnitude on enemies instead of having to math out the distance / etc. So for example, lets say you hit an enemy with Mag 10 KB, but they have some KB resist that makes it Mag 8. They would be swept away, and take 8 * Damage Bonus. If the KB is converted entirely to KD, the bonus likewise gets multiplied by the 0.5 mag it now has.

So, here I gotta throw a flag on the play. Sure, there may be a super Casual McNoobington out there who doesn't slot anything and just presses buttons, but even they have to go to a trainer and level up, and thus get slots. Slots then have enhancements which require them clicking the Enh Tray, which is right next to the Salvage/Recipes which will eventually glow red as they get ignored. Being curious, I bet McNoobington would click on them and get some ideas / questions. But this goes back into the expectations + what the playerbase on the whole is doing.

So, according to Mid's 3 slotted SC + PB = 97.21% end drain, I don't think that is accurate but lets just say it's 100% The purple patch works as such for basically all combat interactions, where if we have 100% end drain, it would go up to 111%, 122%, etc as you go higher than your enemy. Likewise, it lowers to 90%, 80%, etc as you go lower. TBH, this is something I straight up forgot about when it comes to End Drain, and makes it's Zero-Sum mechanics all the more dubious...

I like this a lot, and to be honest we see this in-game in a roundabout way. Ever notice how Council Robots are bosses in the 30's, but in the 40's they're LT's? Or low level Lost have the TV head dudes as LT's, and the Pariah's as Bosses, then they downgrade to Minions and LT's later? This kind of shows how your character is progressing in a neat way, but I feel it could be expanded for the enemy groups too. Why not have some groups ramp up to meet you more?

Again, that points to a key point of the thread: what is *expected*?

This is due to the Purple Patch. A +4 enemy will take 0.48x less effect from end drains, so with that 69% boosted by 78% > 122.82% * .48 = 58.95%. It gets better with the lower con, but yeah...

Hot damn thats a good idea

I'd love it if you had the bosses have actually random buffs like Diablo 3 encounters, so each time is difficult and hard to prepare for / game it.

So, lets toss a hypothetical out there. Say tomorrow we log in and any non proc, unique/special (stuff like LotG which isn't "unique"), purple, etc, IO's could simply drop into your tray as you play. How do you think this would impact your experience?

HC is for sure the best community! Though, there are certainly plenty of cool things out in the wild (like @ScarySaimentioned we need to... proliferate some Necromancy changes hehe), but your mileage will definitely, definitely vary in terms of quality when it comes to not only the community, but the professionalism and general game quality.

Not to leak anything from closed alpha but...

Real World Test 2: Carnies Stone Armor was a suprise! Well, if you think about it it's ability to defend against Psychic Damage specifically was a huge boon on top of it's other defenses that gave it the best average, though all the Defense sets did better on average here. However, Carnies at +4 really just tore everyone a new one with their stacked debuffs out the wazoo. In particular, sets that relied on hitting an enemy for something really fell short with even dark armor hitting a rough spot with their harsh Mask debuffs.

It's going to have /Regen and thus be nerfed