High_Beam

Unless they are spamming general chat then they make me want to set them on fire.

I said some who run fast Manti, I didn't say all; those are really fast. 🙂

When I am PUGing I try to watch the aggro grabber's indicators and roll from there. When I am on my Blapper there is a lot of AoE so I hold my water until they have the herd piled up before unleashing the Five Furies (BoS, Scorpion's Tail, Hail of Bullets (Backflip), Empty Clips, Bullet Rain). I like my aggro grabbers making tight mobs so I let them do their thing and its win win. Do I always get it right, nope. I have not had a aggro grabber lose their mind over issues like this but I can imagine it happens.

There's a lot of feedback in here that is far more detail-driven and data oriented and I tip my hat to those cats because I am not that person. My takeaways from this are merely from playing them for a bit on Test with bumps at 20, 30 and 40 using just SOs because at the core a character is supposed to be fun no matter what. I tested it as a Symphonic (or Symphony) Control/Sonic Resonance Controller and a Symphonic (or Symphony) Control/Fiery Assault Dominator (again because I am not super number person and had ideas as to what I wanted to play thematically). 1. The sound. Its not good. It's really the opposite of what I would call symphonic (or symphony). What would work is something akin to the melodic aspect of Howling Twilight (I think that's what the darkity dark power that is a rez but used often as a stun is). Of course not so loud or jarring but that harmonic resonance really works. There could easily be variations of that instead of . . . whatever the sound is we have. 2. Now speaking of Symphony as in many musical instruments working together to produce something beautiful; this set does that. In playing, especially around level 20 - 30 it was really fun with the cones all flowing well together. As others have said a key here is setting up with the stun then hammering in with the other cones. I didn't seem to have too much problem with positioning but that's always been the way for me who played an energy blaster on live for years who used Energy Torrent tactically to rearrange mob positions. The single target confuse didn't (and doesn't) get used much by me but it fits. The best part was that the locking layers meant I wasn't getting pounded back on too much. I cant wait to run it in a team. 3. Again, the sound. Yuck. This is one of those things that I really am having a hard time dealing with. I know there are customizations that will allow me too turn it off but really, I cant be the only one here.. 4. Now I went with Fire on the Dom because I am still a range kind of gal for the most part. Yes I am getting better but it takes time to erase habits. So the combination is sweet and again, the flow was real good and this is where I noticed something. At 20 I had two fire attacks and almost all of the Symphonic (or symphony) and I was mowing through Warriors in Talos and Freakshow in Bricks (mobs, of like 7). I am no power player, not a super Set IO and min-max guy, not running at +4/+8 on missions. I test with SOs because base play is important, I hate the term "the set shines when you slot Set IOs". It should shine without them and it does, Set IOs later is just gravy on the pancakes. I super enjoyed it. I really look forward to playing this set when it goes live. P.S. - The sound. Ew! Seriously? So Gross.

That was really good information and I stand corrected with my attempt at a joke.

I know of several players that run highly efficient and fast yet still enjoyable Task Force runs (Blapperella), often explaining what will be done so that others can either learn for their own hosting later (am still not good at it) or just so they can stay on script. Some of the more painful ones mentioned go pretty quick when she runs them and aren't so bad (Manticore goes well and even Synapse isn't as bad). Put it this way, when she runs the old OG Positron or Psyche, they run faster than some who are running Manticore with a degree of speed. Why do them, well Merits and badges and in my case, my reptile brain says I have to do it just because. Side note, Moonfire is my way of getting puppies and Snarkys fast.

I ship recipes, salvage and influence around to my alts all day long and yet I never even thought to E-Mail myself inspirations in the event I needed one, how dumb can I be (apparently on a sliding scale its currently a seven). Well the forums taught me something that I already knew and I need to E-Mail @Yomo Kimyata for fun and profit (mostly profit).

Mine says a Nigerian Prince has left me funds.

Right now: Dual Pistols/Martial Combat Blapper; just frantic fun, plus she rocks the mini-skirt. Seismic/Seismic Blaster - I love the animations and love beating people up with rocks. Stomp and stabby rocks appear is like a dream come true. Water anything - Sploosh (Thanks Pam) Back in the Day: It was High Beam a Energy/Energy Blaster - Knockback was a blast before ragdoll effects became dumb looking. You always remember your first.

Subject Line = Unsettling It's like saying Peanut Butter Wrestler but worse.

Yeah I would keep it because pure S/L is totally resisted. Plus there are some enemy types that are more vulnerable to cold or fire or toxic. I mean toxic, who resists that unless they eat my cooking on the regular 🙂

I love the sweeping punch cone of rocks with orange circle bonus. I don't like it when its coming from the bed of a dump truck on the interstate at my windshield.

Crey Corp is LexCorp or Hammer or Roxxon or a dozen other mega corporations in comics with their own private armies, flaunting of law and order and evil leaders. But the Countess is totally like the Baroness from Cobra . . . she so knows how to rock the skirt and heels.

I do a lot of Parroty stuff.

It is the inevitable result of dupin rares and we all know what comes next.

This and the other comments are fair enough, but I am not there, I am still learning and slow. Soon I will have Total Focus and Energy Transfer and I know (have seen) the difference, but I have to be honest with what I am right now.

But my mercs died so long ago they are now zombies.

Is it strange that the first thing that came to my mind was "I didn't know one of the Warrior Maidens from Thundercats had a last name". Then I also realized that it was Willa not Willow.

This is what I have come to appreciate with my limited experience playing tanks. On live I was Blaster heavy followed by Controller and Defender. I had a sum total of two (2) melee characters, a terrible scrapper and a crappy tank. Both that way because of my poor building and my poor play. I never really got a lot of what a tank was because I was just blowing stuff away and I always assumed they were too. I never realized how low their damage output in comparison to others was. When I came to HC I started to dip into tanking more in order to enjoy an aspect of the game I hadn't when it was live and becoming grindy (Blaster number 12 please) and I realized how slow their damage output was. Initially I was like "screw this" and tried to be all damagy and the end result was I got my buttocks handed to me way to often because my armors were nowhere near up to snuff and my damage still blew dog. I read around the forums and then decided to embrace the truth of tanking, we take a beating forever and take forever to beat someone down. And as I accepted this I really liked the thematic element and then the feel of keeping those mobs on me so others may defeat them. There is nothing wrong with being relegated (mostly) to a role. Several posts in this thread speak to "if I just wanted to stand around I'd do X instead" and that's fine, good on you, you play how you play. But @Hyperstrike's quote sums it up for me. The moral victory of the damn-near draw of a fight is what makes playing a tank memorable to me. It's not always about ripping through enemies, its about having scores of creeps piling on you as you slug it out, having taunted them stupid so that they ignore the the shooters that are wiping them out. Stupid villains, when will they learn. Nothing made me feel more super-powered than when I was on a SG team doing Freakshow missions set to +4/+8 and I was level 30 with no IOs or Set IOs yet and they were level 54 and I was tanking them and not dying. They were so purple even Prince would have been jealous and I wasn't hitting crap but I was surviving and taunting so my team mates could do their thing, it was glorious. Oh and just so we are clear on how slow my tank is, pink pom poms of death (but they do look Seksi on me).

The coin flip guy in AP. Haul would have been so apropos (D&D).

It's nice to see different ways of doing the same thing. Now when I am not tanking a radio I love to bring my DP/MC Blapper with all that secksi AoE ripping things up while the tank keeps aggro and there in lies the rub, running vs being a productive part of. Putting holes in enemy faces (and other parts) is just Awe-Some! And that mini-skirt . . . so cute.

That rapier makes me tingly! Might have to un-retire my dual blades toon.

I am still new to tanking, I had one back on live and wasn't very good at it so I promised myself when I joined HC that I would be better. I use Radios (all levels) to practice my tanking. First I set the Diff up as much as I can take and solo them so I can learn get better at corner pulls and herding and watching my aggro cap as well as just getting a general feel of tanking. Then I host, so I can get better at steering the group i.e. not letting crazy blasters like I was jump ahead and super aggro everything get killed and yell "why aren't u tanking". I am not quite up there myself (tank not level enough yet). However the group I run with tends to stay consistent with Council (S/L) which works quite well with Invulnerability on a tanker even when they are conning level 54.

I don't even know what mission it is other than its low level against the Clockwork (and I don't think a story arc, definitely not Clockwork Captive) and there is wandering NPC dialog from a Clockwork that says "I Hate" followed by the name of my character (i.e. I Hate High Beam). There is something so satisfying that these little robot creeps have that much hate for my character that they just say it while wandering around always. Whenever I see it I just laugh.

I have played D&D in its various forms since 1979. But D&D is a niche, not something that will inherently appeal to millions of viewers needed for a box office that could be considered successful. Look at Judge Dredd, and I mean both the Stallone and Urban versions. Stallone's was terrible from story and other aspects but it also hit many things dead on (uniform, the bikes, the Angel family) and to be blunt its how I always saw Joe Dredd (even though the writers themselves always swayed more toward Clint). Urbans was a great film and clearly had more appeal but with that the hard part to get over is that fascists are the good guys, people are not comfortable with that which will always make Dredd, no matter how good the story or anything else is, a niche product. It didn't do well in the box office and they flat out said if it didn't make at least X dollars, there would be no sequel. D&D movie needs to not say D&D, not point to the tropes of D&D, at least not to the general audience. Also, don't say Lord of the Rings lite or Game of Thornes without the nudity, but don't say D&D. And that's the part that hurts my heart because I love D&D as a game and a franchise but I would not help things because I would want a Forgotten Realms D&D movie or a Greyhawk D&D movie, one that is its own thing but leverages that wealth of lore. I don't want a generic D&D movie which is what I see. The problem is that that would require catering to a smaller cadre of fans (FR vs GH or Tyr help us Ebberon) which would further limit the likelihood of success. Oh and the promotional material, the trailers and the interviews (which translate to more money invested on the product), turn me off from wanting to see it. We cant have nice things.