Projector

IF anyone has T4 barrier on any toon, regardless of build, I will be happy to bring you on a 4Star. Depending on your power sets, I may ask you not to use certain things at certain times because some powers can cause a failure of certain objectives outright, such as uncontrollable pets, but otherwise, anyone is welcome. 🙂 Just hit me up. Also happy to invite anyone to my public discord where I usually schedule and host runs throughout the week. And yes, you can even bring a Sentinel 😉

Except the meta runs already include Clarion and Incandescence, and the Barrierless runs I just referenced use Rebirth and even Ageless Radial. KM 4Star ITF runs sometimes use Ageless Radial. Meta Aeon runs swap to Clarion Radial during the last mission for the range boost, and Corrupted runs, which are a type of run where you only use Corruptors, Tanks/Scrapper-tank, and Blasters, but don't allow Kin, Nature, or Cold, utilize Ageless Core as well. Not really sure what you're looking for at this point, because if your issue is cookie cutter teams that all use Barrier, I've just given you a ton of examples that didn't use barrier, have varying ATs, with even a widow tanking instead of a tank, and hell, I've tanked it with a toggle-less tank that only uses Brawl. And any change that would make "bigger defense and to hit numbers" irrelevant would be a change that would likely affect full 8-man teams. Regardless, it's been consistently true throughout the majority of this game's history as far as I know that the smaller you make the teams, the more restrictive the team comps get. That even applies to iTrials (for some master of attempts). You say they are Charity ATs...but with the way the game is designed makes it so that in your scenario, the stuff that is currently considered meta would only be even stronger. One example: the reason we don't need Dominators or Controllers in Lady Grey is because every AT has access to holds, and it's just a fact that other ATs also offer more damage. In LGTF, if you hold Dragon, his stats drop considerably. Turns out though, that it's just faster to DPS him outright than it is to try and keep him held the entire fight. The DPS you lose trying to keep him held is worse than the reduced DPS you do when he isn't held. Same is true in ITF--if you hold the Emerald barrier nova, it becomes unkillable and Romulus' Regen drops to 0, making him easier and quicker to kill....except that you lose more investing resources in trying to keep that nova held than you do by just, again, outright DPSing and debuffing Romulus manually. The mechanics exist to do everything you're describing and to open up and encourage different strategies...the issue you moreso have is that most people don't want to spend hours doing one thing when they could spend one hour doing multiple things...so the speedier tactics seem to win the day when it comes to hard mode content, and as someone who leads them regularly and teaches people them constantly, I am in that camp. Leading these things is straight up exhausting, and doubling or tripling the amount of time I have to spend leading them is a prospect I dread lol The problem is moreso in how the power sets have been developed and how the proliferation via patron/epic pools impact that as well. As I said, you can basically do whatever you want. Just have to be creative with the team.

@Rudra is correct. Making the teams smaller would only further limit which ATs and powersets get brought. It's also worth pointing out that you can currently do any of the 4Star content any way you want, so long as you are hitting certain stat minimums regularly. I've seen teams of all Dominators complete 4Star ITF, all Masterminds complete Aeon and LGTF, and I know of one group that has done Barrierless runs of LGTF, Aeon, and ITF, and each with less than 10 deaths. The LGTF was 30:11 with only 1 death, the ASF was 52:54 with 4 deaths. The comp even includes a Dark Miasma Controller (because of Fade + debuffs). Also, the only deathless LGTF I am aware of was done with all Defenders. I've completed 4Star TFs with 6 people because of DCs, as well. It just largely depend on which roles DC lol. Honestly, if I have 6 Meta characters on the team, I can bring literally whatever for the last two slots and it would be exactly the same, just slower. That's really the only difference the added challenges give: It's slower. If you want to challenge yourself further in hard mode content, the means to do so are already there, you just have to dream up some crazy team comps. Happy to help you with defense/resist thresholds if you need! Proof of barrierless LGTF and Aeon is below, names blurred out for obvious reasons. The Widow was also the tank for both runs. If you want to do something different, no one is stopping you, just like no one stopped these teams 🙂

And then there’s me 🙂

At first, I thought it would be funny. Then, it turned into wanting to see how much survivability I could squeeze out from literally just set bonuses. Then, it just continued to be hilarious, and proved a lot of points about the meta conversation in 4Star content 😄 at this point he has tanked: Really Hard Way 4Star LGTF 4Star Aeon MoBAF MoTPN (was outside tank for Maelstrom) and I think he’s done more, I just can’t remember off the top of my head. :D

The mission ends (technically, the lab explodes, destroying everything inside) and your team continues on! You just exit the mission dead, which is convenient since the hospital is going to be near the Hami mission! It's a free 4Star Mission TP 😄

You can softcap, but as Psyonico said, you will have to make a LOT of sacrifices, basically neutering your damage output, which is the whole point of going Corruptor over Defender. Imo, it's best to aim for around 30% in either typed or positional defenses. At 30%, it just takes one small purple inspiration to softcap you for normal content, and 2 to softcap for incarnate content. This is the best compromise as it allows you to still include some meaningful damage, HP, recharge, and accuracy into your build while still remaining very survivable.

PVE - Archery-Tactical Arrow Blaster (Projector Version).mbd Unfortunately, as others will state as well, Archery is one of the lower DPS sets in the game, but Rain of Arrows -> Oil Slick Arrow + Explosive Blast is nothing to laugh at in terms of damage, and this will be your bread and butter for clearing mobs, which is why the build I'm attaching invests a lot in recharge. I've given you access to TP as well as Super Speed. TP is the most "OP" travel power, and by using a few keybinds, you can make it FAR easier to use. /bind KEY powexeclocation cursor teleport (this aims it wherever your cursor is on screen. You don't even have to aim the power manually. Just click this bind and it will auto fire toward your cursor) /bind KEY powexeclocation target teleport (Self-explanatory, but TPs you directly to your target, even around corners/without line of sight! /bind KEY powexeclocation self combat teleport (useful for combat teleporting in place for the to-hit buff without really interrupting your attack chain.) /bind key powexeclocation cursor combat teleport (same as the first one, but this is for really quick movement in a fight. Sometimes your animations may put you in a tough spot, and this can get you out immediately) I've made sure you have at least 30% on typed defenses, with the obvious exceptions of Psi, Toxic, and Negative Energy. One small purple insp will softcap all other typed defenses in normal content, and 2 will softcap it for incarnate content (iTrials, DA, anywhere all your level shifts apply, basically). I would normally make this a LOT more aggressive with less focus on survivability, but that's because I don't mind rolling with some inspirations to keep me going so I can maximize my damage in my builds. So, normally I wouldn't be using the winter sets and would be going with a lot more procs/HOs (so, more of the powers would look like Explosive Blast does). I don't know how much you play blasters, but as you get better with positioning and learn how to survive without as many toggles, you can spec out of Scorpion Shield and go for the Fire Mastery pool, which would give you Char and Melt Armor, which are both really strong powers and Melt Armor would give you access to some AoE debuff, too! For Incarnates, I went with Musculature Radial for the End Mod, but you can start with Musculature Core and switch to Radial if you are having endurance problems. I also gave you Assault Radial for the Hybrid since it will give you access to another free proc. If you take the time to get the health accolades, your HP will be just around 103 below the Blaster HP Cap, which means when those big hits do occasionally get through any def, you are much more likely to survive. Good luck to you!

What were the goals you had for the character and what were the outcomes you didn't like? The buff/debuff numbers will be better on a Defender than a Corruptor, but the damage output will be lower. On average, even when factoring in the increased buff/debuff strength that Defenders get, Corruptors will still out-damage them because of Scourge and higher base DPS numbers. So, if your goal is to be a hybrid of good damage and protecting the team, Corruptor would be the way to go. But I will also say that if I need to hard-carry a team from the support role, I'm bringing a Defender 100% of the time. If I get the sense that I won't be able to trust my team or that something is missing, I will whip out a Defender, especially if it's nature or Kin, because the heals are a lot stronger. My logic is: There's only so much I can do to kill tough enemies on my own, even if I'm playing a pure DPS role, but if I can keep my team alive for longer, they'll eventually find the right target, too, even if it's the last one remaining. I run into a lot of this in starred content, and I can tell you several runs where I've either played a Kin Defender or a Nature Defender because I knew the team was struggling, and there would have been no way we would have completed the runs successfully if I had brought my Corruptor versions of those characters. So, if your goal is to play more of a support role, Defender would be the way to go, imo. Your shields will all be stronger, you'll just do less damage.

Okay? My ask is that all armor sets grant it, not some. No specific reason to treat it any different from hold, stun, or sleep, imo, other than an arbitrary weak point.

I don't know if it's me, or if there was a change in one of the last major patch updates, but for the last several months it seems as though Tanks/Brutes get Terrified way more easily than they did before. I can't verify that's the case other than anecdotally, as it could be that I'm just playing content now where fear is a way more commonly used mechanic by enemy groups, but even if it's always been this way, my point doesn't change: Tankers should have fear protection. I don't really understand why the ATs that are supposed to be able to get into the action, take the brunt of the blows for their team, and stand on the front line, are just as easily scared by enemy attacks as the rest of the team they are trying to protect. I could understand it from the perspective of there being a threat so big/terrifying that even the Tanker gets scared sometimes, but then why do powers like "Increase Density" break them free? Suddenly I'm not as afraid of a giant Hamidon because I am more density is higher? Or Why can a random enemy fear me with Terrify, but not be able to put me to sleep with Mass Hypnosis if it's a they are both mental tricks? The logic isn't really consistent, and the mechanic doesn't really add any sort of appreciated difficulty for tanking, in my opinion, mostly it's just really annoying that there's a random form of mez that affects Tankers like it does everyone else and it feels disruptive in a way that is frustrating far more frustrating than it is interesting, because, again, why I am being feared feels entirely arbitrary and like it's just meant to give Melee armors a weakness just for the sake of having a weakness. Every time I've talked about this with other players who either main or have experience with melee toons seem to share this feeling. Especially since most mechanics that increase difficulty seem to exclusively punish melee range characters (which, unfortunately, seems to be a common trend in MMOs): Marauder's Nova Fist Anti-Matter's Atomic Blast Sentinel's white regen aura Avatar of Hamidon's end sapping Starred LGTF Rikti Assault Suit Neural Fields Starred ITF crystal explosions Starred Romulus Void Judgement Minds of Mayhem World of Anguish (While this one impacts the whole league, melee players specifically are unable to attack unless the AV is moved. You have a 7-second window between Anguish spawns to attack otherwise, while Ranged toons just move slightly to the side and can keep attacking for free.) To also have a form of cc that is all but guaranteed to affect melee characters of any armor set when they are supposed to be the ones that are able to resist cc in general just feels bad to play. (While we're at it, updating Plasma Shield to be on par with other mez resist toggles would be cool, too, but I'll take what I can get!) Can we please get some Fear protection in the Mezz protection toggles in the Melee sets at the same Mag protection level as other major forms of mez?

Happy to provide some clarification. It's going to be long, and I hope it's not taken as condescending or mean. I'm really trying to be thorough and clear in my explanation, and provide several examples to help that goal. I'm always down for the conversation and happy to engage :). With that said, I hope you brought your reading glasses! We begin our novel as thus: Yes, the bulk of survivability in team and league content comes from barriers and other destinies, and when it comes to league and team survivability, it's kind of a soup of buffs. Everyone firing their buffs helps the team. Yet this is not always a reliable thing. I run iTrials all the time where, in iTrials like MoM or UG, Clarion is an important Destiny to have, and I discover that no one has it. Or I have been in leagues where literally no one brought buffs or we only have a few healers, but no added defenses or other stats. It happens so commonly, it's a running joke now amongst friends how often I end up having to load in two accounts into a trial just to provide something the league is missing. I also lead a lot of 4Star content and run an open Discord where I help others learn how to approach hard mode content. There's a reason the strongest buff set requested in 4Star is Cold Domination--it gives defense buffs as well as debuffs. Literally 3 of them in a standard meta team. And you can absolutely feel a difference if so much as one or two of those Cold Dom players are not running Nerve Core Alpha for the increased defense buff--their shields really make a huge difference in the team's survivability, and that's with consistent Barrier rotations that keep the team above 125% Ranged Defense. Sometimes people miss a barrier or are late, or someone dies, rezzes, and needs buffs to stay alive until the next Barrier. Things like that are common. The buffer matters more than you think. And building for more individual survivability is not the answer to that problem, as it means you are likely sacrificing damage/recharge/max hp, which can make some fights impossible to complete. It's also true that you can accomplish 4Star runs with almost anything you want to bring, provided you meet certain stat minimums and have Lores. The further you get away from the stronger sets/powers, the longer the runs will take and the more difficult the fights will often be. Literally the difference between having 2-3 -heal debuffs OR not having a few -rech debuffs in the K'ong/Dra'Gon fight in LGTF is the difference between that fight taking less than 5 minutes or the fight taking almost all of the 25-minute timer you have to complete it. And trust me, one of those is WAY more stressful and difficult than the other. Needlessly so. There was a run recently where I was on the verge of tears from the stress and subsequent relief after leading through a 21-minute K'ong fight in which we did not have enough -rech and only one -heal. We were successful, which is great! But as a leader, I have a right to enjoy the content, too, which means I shouldn't have to subject myself to that level of stress every time I lead something just to make room for players who refuse to bring what will help the team succeed. I don't want that stress every time I lead a run, so yeah, I don't think there's anything wrong with me asking for specific powersets/roles on a team. Just as there is nothing objectively wrong with a player building the way they want to build, there is also nothing wrong with other players wanting to do a faster/less stressful run through the content. If you had the choice between a 30-minute ITF with 15 deaths or a 90-minute ITF with 350 deaths (Immortal Recoveries cost ~1 mil, so that's an expensive run), which would you choose? Are you wrong for not preferring one versus the other, or are you wrong for not wanting to join a run in which the players prefer the option that you don't? I've been a part of both kinds of runs, and seen some 4star runs be as long as 3 hours with over 600 deaths. For the players that enjoy that, wonderful! That's never going to be me, and no one is wrong for either preference. Overall, I agree with your comments, I would expect the player to do the exact same as you would regarding kitting out their current build and when they would make a second build. In fact, I would bring OP on a 4Star run, but I would have to bring them as the 8th spot on the team once I have every other role and need solidified. Without shields, the thematic build provides almost no value to what a 4Star team needs aside from Heat Loss, Benumb, and Sleet. And btw, I'm not in any way trying to be mean about that, but I am being blunt, because knowing what I know after doing countless 4Star runs, there are several fights in which I would basically have to tell OP, "Only use Arcane Bolt, Flares, and Electric Fence/Shackles, please" and tell them to ignore 90% of their kit because it would actively cause problems in specific fights. It can also cause us to have to soft-reset certain missions (such as accidentally freeing a hostage before K'ong spawns). And resetting missions in TFs SUCKS because of a current bug where if everyone logs out, sometimes logging back in results in the team being literally split into 2 teams, forcing you to have to restart the whole TF. All that said, It's totally okay for OP to do whatever they want to do! I have never once said "don't do it." I've just tried to be honest about the potential outcomes they are worried about, and the reasons those outcomes exist. OP asked if they would encounter problems running a build in which they don't take key powers in the set. I am answering that yes, they likely will for certain content. Whether you or I think it's right or wrong for them to have those problems is irrelevant to OP's purposes. Also, no player is entitled to join a team that has a very particular goal in mind or is looking for a specific team composition. If I say I want to do an all Mastermind ITF, other ATs wouldn't be welcome by definition. If I want to do something in which I am looking for a source of additional defense buffs for the team, then players without those buffs wouldn't be welcome by definition. If I say I have one spot open for a Tank, a Blaster wouldn't be welcome by definition. To drive my point home: In my opinion, expecting a player to "have a full compliment of higher-end Enhancement set bonuses slotted" for MoX content is no different than a leader expecting a Cold Domination player to have ice/glacial shields for the same content. They both impact the potential for the run to be successful. I also don't know why the burden would be on any leader to accept someone on their team who isn't built properly for whatever is being attempted, and not on the player to build what is needed or preferred for that content? Why is it a tall ask only to ask players to bring a build that's relevant to the content, but not a tall ask for the leaders to accommodate that build when it could likely end up being a waste of time for the other 7 players on the team? It's an attitude I face quite frequently, and myself and many others who lead content regularly have either gotten burned out for periods of time or have had a hard time continuing to lead content because they are forced to either eat constant crap from players who are upset they can't come (for things as simple as the team already being full when they ask to join) or a much higher failure rate from trying to accommodate everyone who wants to come. After a while, that stuff does wear on you, thick skin or not, because it goes on for months and months. I see Hami leads get flamed all the time for the zone being full by the time that player tried to enter. Not even remotely the league leader's fault that the player was too late, but that disappointment and anger gets misplaced and put onto the leader. If I am going to take 30 minutes or an hour or however long to lead something, I would hope that the players that come would respect that time/effort enough to bring what is needed to do the content well. I would hope that the players that participate would want to do everything they could to make the run successful, and to be blunt, I'm not going to waste my time leading an MoLGTF, MoITF, 4Star LGTF, RHW, etc. that I have little reason to believe will be successful. I have RSIs in both arms, so it's actually really important for me to minimize how much I play and optimize how I spend that time playing. If players don't want to respect that, then that's okay, there are other teams and other leaders, and there is nothing stopping those players from leading a team themselves and approaching it whatever way they want to 🙂 I really don't think there is any bad guy here, nor do I think you're saying anyone is the bad guy. I don't think leaders are the bad guys for wanting to form their teams any specific way, nor do I think players like OP are the bad guys for wanting to build a certain way. They just have different goals for their playstyle, and there is nothing wrong with that. It is just a natural outcome of the choices both players made for how they are playing the game that day.

Hey, it's your build, your character, to play the way you want to play. Thanks for the context! I do want to be clear: I wasn't telling you that you shouldn't play cold dom, but was just trying to suggest an alternate route that may get you less friction in game, but I really think you won't encounter that friction super often (most will never look at your build or anything. I'm usually totally unaware of what powers my teammates have when I do just any random content). But yeah, I support people playing the game the way they want to play it as long as they are honest/upfront in dealing with the potential expectations their teams have. I think the main places you'll have problems is where those buffs matter: Master Of Task Forces/Trials in which deaths are not permitted, any hard mode content, etc. I lead a lot of hard mode and master of content and I can be honest with you in saying I would have reservations about having you on a coordinated team unless you had a second build that was more optimally-minded. Those shields provide a LOT of defense for the team. Again, I'm in full support of you playing the way you want to play, but I want to be honest about the opportunity cost with the decision, since that's what this thread is about. Looking at your build, and if it's okay with you, I wanted to throw a couple of suggestions slot-wise! If it's not okay, pretend the post ended 2 sentences ago. I tried very hard to not negatively impact your theme, though I apologize in advance if I suggest anything that bothers you. Again, not my intent, I just have to fight the "optimal build" part of my brain that would make a lot of changes. I want to help you accomplish your theme! 1. I would move the 2nd slot in Aim over to Tactics and give it a third Gaussian's set IO so that you can get the +max hp set bonus 2. Take the last two slots from Rune of Protection, move them to Arcane Bolt, and 6-slot it with Superior Winter's Bite for the Defense buffs 3. Swap the slotting from Sleet and Fire Ball. Sleet doesn't do a lot of damage period as its main highlight is the stacking debuff. Fire Ball, however, is incredible with procs. I would also put an Acc/Dam HO OR a +5 boosted Accuracy IO in one slot on any proc'd attacks as these do have a tohit check. Ragnarok works in Sleet just fine for the set bonuses and the flat damage will be better there, but you could also put Frozen Avalanche for the additional Defense. 3a. For Fire Ball I would do one Accuracy IO, Positron's Blast Proc, Bombardment Proc, Javelin's Volley Proc, and Annihilation -res Proc. 4. I do find it really ironic that you don't want to play this as a support, but you took Spirit Ward, which requires you to stay within a certain range of whoever you cast it on for it stay active, and Enflame, which is another targeted buff. You say you don't want to play support, yet took two support powers that are also objectively worse and harder to use than the ice shields. Take my suggestion here for what it's worth, but if you're going to go with support powers anyway, you may as well go with the best options that don't break the theme, which I personally think the shields fit as a form of defense/protection magic. You still get the runic symbol vfx with mystic flight, translocation, arcane bolt, and Rune of Protection. If you agree with me on this point, and if you remove the entire Leadership pool, and you would free up 4 power slots in the exact build you attached without changing anything else. That could get you access to Blaze, Blazing Bolt, Inferno, and Infrigidate (for a ice blast pew pew), 5. I'm not sure how intentional this was, but building for resistances isn't going to help as much with survivability as you might think since your max HP is low as a Corruptor. It would be overall wiser to build for Defenses, aiming for 30%, as then one small purple will softcap you in regular content. 6. Change Tough to 3 slotted with Aegis for the Fire/Cold Def 7. Switch from Electric Mastery to Mu Mastery to get Charged Armor immediately, and then get Electric Shackles, which is a better power than Electric Fence. Change the slotting on Charged Armor to be 3 Aegis + the Max HP proc from Unbreakable Guard 7. I would find a way to add one additional slot to Health for the Preventative Medicine Absorb proc and then add one more slot to Mystic Flight so you can do 3 of the Hypersonic set+1 KB Reduction from Zephyr 8. Put the Shield Wall +Res proc in one of the shield powers, and replace one of the Shield Walls in Arctic Fog for the Steadfast Protection +def proc I worry that you don't really do much damage, especially when up against single targets. Flares is the lower damaging fire blast power (though I understand the thematic reasons for taking it and I like it a lot). In a fight, I'm not entirely sure what role you functionally play. If you're not doing damage, you're playing a support toon, period. In this case, you do more support via debuffs and slows. So if you're goal was to distance yourself from playing a support role, I think you accidentally landed on playing another support toon, just one that interacts with the enemy more than your own team, and I worry this will be pretty frustrating for you long-term from a gameplay perspective. Missing Blazing Bolt, Blaze, and Inferno REALLY hurts, too. Still having a hard time accepting that one 😂 I have run out of time to make more suggestions, but I would definitely want to find a way to improve the S/L defenses, as it's only at 18% with all the suggested changes I made, versus fire/cold at 42% and E/NE at 25%. Again, I really hope you hear me as trying to be helpful, not critical. Anything I've been "critical" of has only been in the interest of speaking to your thread's original purpose--how the playerbase would react to such a build/theme. I'm not trying to tell you it's a bad idea to do it the way that you want, or that you shouldn't, but trying to suggest other options and ways of accomplishing the same goal that you have! If you're having fun and not ruining anyone else's fun, then no harm done and I'm happy you've found that!

At the risk of sounding overly pedantic, I feel it's important to point out that every power in Cold Domination is a "support" power. Debuffing the enemy is as much a support as buffing your allies. So if you want Cold Domination without the support powers, well, then you wouldn't be able to use Cold Domination at all. Admittedly, it is a little strange to hate one of the main highlights of the set. Every power in Cold Domination is either a debuff or a buff, period. There is only 1 power that does damage on its own (Sleet), and Infrigidate can do damage if you slot it with procs, but does no damage on its own. Along those lines, I think that the shields also work as a sort of "protection magic" within the mage concept. I would also group them with Arctic Fog with that classification, as it buffs defense in addition to the aoe stealth buff. So that's something to consider. You are a powerful mage that can protect and strengthen your allies while simultaneously weakening your foes. Add to that the fact that shields only have to be refreshed every few minutes means that you aren't really having to play an active buffing role all that much, and you only have to hit them once and they'll apply to all team/leaguemates in range. No one will care if you skip Frostwork, but I do think people will care if you skip the shields, which are a real highlight of the set. In some content, you may actually get rejected outright from teams because you don't have the shields, as that's a huge selling point of why you bring Cold Domination to specific content. Ironically, you'll also get a ton of grief if you don't set those shields to Minimal FX in the costume creator. People hate those blocky ice shields, which means you can lightly troll friends with them (not randoms!). As @BZRKR pointed out, the other value of shields is for IOs. You can get a ton of value out of what sets you put in those shields, or even individual IOs in terms of LoTG recharge IOs and other procs. Based on that, it really seems something like an Ice/Fire blaster or Fire/Ice Blaster would probably fit what you're looking for more, as it seems you are wanting to be more offensively minded. Especially seeing as most of the Cold Domination powers have minimal visual effects, I would wager that it won't feel as visceral playing it within the theme you are going for, whereas you could still execute your theme without worrying about how the player base might react. In fact, Ice/Fire is one of the stronger combos for Blasters, too. I have one that's a lot of fun! Ice/Fire/Fire on Blaster is a great triple-threat combo with access to powers like Char, Fire Shield, and Melt Armor that really add some variety to the kinds of "spells" you are casting! You can hold people with Freeze Ray or Char, you can trap them in an "endless Blizzard" with Blizzard/Ice Storm (and Burnout to really sell it), you can make the ground around you burn with Hot Feet, and because Hot Feet has a fear mechanic in it, enemies will try to run away from you as they realize they will burn alive if they get too close! You can trap enemies in a Ring of Fire, or conjure up a Fire Sword when enemies get to close, cutting through them and setting them ablaze. That being said, it's City of Heroes, not City of Shields, so play this game how you want to, and if you are willing to accept without offense that others may not want to have that playstyle on their team, that's okay, too. And I speak from experience, too. I have a Stone/Energy Melee Tanker that only uses Brawl and doesn't use a single power from either Stone Armor or Energy Melee. Whenever I play it, I am very transparent about what my team should expect from me, which is nothing. 😄

Again, standing right here. 😉

Damn man...I'm right here

Idea: Add the ability to ping a spot either directly on the map or visually on screen for other players on your team/league. Make this setting DISABLED by default, like so many other settings are, such as showing target distance. It could also be a "Only Accept Leader Ping" or "League Lead Only" or "Team Lead Only" option to minimize trolling. Reason: For coordinated content, such as MoKeyes or hardmode content, the pace of the fights and the need to communicate actually makes some of the harder content of the game pretty inaccessible to people who are uncomfortable using Discord or who outright refuse. I know this is a player-driven move, but I have encountered a lot of frustration when I want to help other players earn badges or complete/learn content that very few, if any, leaders are willing to lead outside of voice chat. Putting coordinates in chat is also a frustrating experience because it also requires you to go into the content separately to even get the coordinates in the first place, which admittedly, is much more frustrating for iTrials. Just calling directions or calling out where to go is entirely too confusing/unreliable. If I say "go left," but a player happens to be facing the opposite direction to me, then there is confusion. If I say "Go East," well the compass in the nav bar is VERY small and people often forget it's even there, and in addition, many players don't play with their map open because they play on smaller screens and need the real estate. I'll give you an example that happened to me the other night while leading a 4Star Lady Grey. During the K'ong fight, we ended up in an unlucky enough position that each of the four Assault Suits blew up in each of the four corners of the room, leaving behind neural fields that made fighting in the corners impossible. So I had to tell my team that instead of fighting in the corners, the middle of each side would be the new "corner" until the neural fields faded. This was an easy adjustment to make in voice, but without voice chat, there really isn't that much time to type custom instructions to the team while fulfilling my role as a lead and actually doing my job. What would have been amazing would have been if I could literally just mark a waypoint on everyone's screen/map and it would be very easy to communicate where I need the team to go next. Likewise for MoKeyes. I spent months brainstorming and tinkering a MoKeyes strategy that would work reliably for a full league of players for an SG I'm a part of. I landed on a strategy that relied on 6 players incanning out of the Obliteration Beam crosshair, but just back and forth between two pre-determined spots: AM's spawn location in the middle and forward from there in between the first and third regen stations. Eight attempts later, and people were still struggling to understand what the two spots were, and the second we would incan, they would be all turned around and would be confused. This happened both when trying to have the whole league move themselves, or when teaching new incanners. I even tried getting the coordinates in a separate run for the two points I wanted incans to aim for, and then typed macros that told the player "AIM HERE: COORDINATES" and they still wouldn't get it. In fact, the majority of the times this method has been successful is when we had a Tac Arrow Blaster with Oil Slick Arrow or I brought my Nature with Lifegiving Spores, so we were able to lay down a visual patch in the spot we wanted incanners to aim for. It was essentially a makeshift location ping. These are two niche instances, and I totally recognize that! I also think that the playerbase will find many many positive use cases for this, and I could see it being a wonderful edition to the game. I don't know how possible something like this would be, and I'm sure that it will somehow break DFB or cause level 1 Hellions to one-shot through Barrier, but I do know that there may be additional hardmode content in the future, and I know how frustrating trying to give directions in this game can be for content that does require some level of coordination. Being able to mark a location for another player would be incredible, and having it be a setting that is defaulted to "off" would absolutely make it opt-in would minimize trolling.

I hear you. To be clear, I wasn't trying to accurately describe your attitude, I was explaining how your post was coming across to some players. Wanted you to be aware of that was all. What shard are you on? I am on Excel and I will say that throughout ToT it was VERY difficult to get other events going, and I know of several TFs, iTrials, MSRs, and Hamis that all ended up being cancelled bc there weren't enough players available. That sucked and I really wish that event was shorter, like 1-2 weeks instead of the whole month. Hopefully, that will alleviate things a bit. But, if you are on any other shard, yeah, it's going to be difficult to do it. Also, I lead a lot of content, and I tailored all of my builds to include things like a hold, TP Target, Combat TP, Fold Space, Incan, and debuffs like Melt Armor where possible in order to help my teams/leagues as much as possible. Precisely bc I never want to be in the position where I can't complete something, I do everything I can to ensure I can put the team on my back as much as possible when I need to. I've had to make some sacrifices in build choices/optimization, but as a leader, I'm usually typing or spamming macros anyway, so as long as I can carry out the core portion of my role while doing so, I don't mind. I would highly recommend that approach if you are someone who leads content regularly (which, if you do, THANK YOU! We need more). And I can tell you that if you take one Hold from an epic/patron pool and you grab the origin hold power, you will be able to hold the greens on your own, albeit it will take a little bit. While you're at it, pick up the GEAS and Vanguard Medal accolades. They REALLY help with holds and recharge, speeding up the process significantly. If you don't want to, log in a toon on Excel and I will literally get you everything you need for those any time. Feel free to add my global in game @Project0r and if you have trouble finding a team or need an 8th for something, I'll happily transfer a toon over and help out if I am free! Regardless of how you choose to proceed, I'm glad that the devs were so quick to implement your second concept idea by including origin temps at the START vendor that they implemented it before you even suggested it! So I guess the matter is resolved? Good work, us!

I love my Stj/Stone Stalker. It's a lot of fun! I would agree with most of what Betty suggested, but I played around with a few different things. I'm visual, so I hope you don't mind I downloaded your build and made some edits! It looks like you were prioritizing Melee/S/L Def, so I tried to keep that, but did switch some other things around: Project0r Version Stalker (Street Justice - Electric Armor)5.mbd Swapped the set out in TP to two range IOs (which I would boost to +5). Since you aren't running Super Speed, this range will feel REALLY good, especially across zones or when teleporting to teammates in mission maps. For example, in LRSF, if you get the access code to unlock the door to Ms Liberty, these two range IOs will allow you to TP back to your teammates from the room with the glowie. 😄 I did make a couple of slot changes to get you some additional max HP. Without accolades, you were down at ~1,300 with a possible max being 2088. If you do get the Accolades, with the changes I made you'll be at 1688 (Without the passive accolades, this build puts you at 1443). I think Max HP gets way overlooked in most builds, since the hits are guaranteed to come at some point no matter how much defense/res you build. Also the Power Transfer set's Chance to Heal is almost always better than flat regen buffs, and stacking them as much as possible can make a big difference in how quickly you regen, even though it obviously won't show in the regen numbers. Power Transfer also does have better set bonuses, so I swapped it into Power Sink. If you are willing to give up a slot somewhere else, say the 6th Ragnarok in Spinning Strike, you could get one more Power Transfer Proc in Stamina. Given your plan to aggressively use Power Sink, you will gain around 180 HP each time all three proc. Leaving it at only 2 would still be around 120hp each time they proc Imo, I would suggest procing something. For example, you could leave the Hecatomb in CU, and proc Assassin's Strike, leaving just the Acc/Dam and the Hide Proc from the ATO set. For the increased number of proc options, I chose to proc out CU, plus who doesn't love more psi damage? This does knock down CU's recharge from ~6 to ~9 seconds, so you may have a slight gap, but that can usually be made up with Placate. Speaking of Placate, throwing two boosted recharge IOs made it virtually equivalent, being 17.02 now whereas before you had 5 slots in it and the recharge was 16.96. Functionally, this shouldn't feel any different. Personally, on my build I have just about everything proc'd that can and I have zero issues with damage output. That being said, Stone Armor is a lot less reliant on set bonuses to get adequate survivability, so that's a little skewed. Basically, I did sacrifice some recharge, but I do think you'll see a little more survivability, while also allowing you to put out some serious damage. An extra almost 400 HP is nothing to scoff at, especially when it means you don't have to give up any defense and only a little resist. Betty most likely knows more than me on all of this, so I'm happy to defer to them and I look forward to having my suggestions torn apart 😄

I totally understand the spirit of your suggestion, and I'm glad you're thinking about the game differently. I don't want to discourage this kind of thinking, and I also want to applaud that you included suggestions, not just a complaint about the content while offering nothing in terms of a solution. Onto your actual complaint and suggestion: 1. Having content that does have some barrier to entry in regard to preparation is a good thing. If you enter into missions unprepared, you will get your ass kicked. That would be true of real-life heroes/villains, as well, I imagine.. So those players with modest or bad builds? Imo, they should encounter content that potentially makes them rethink their build and consider ways to iterate on it. It challenges players to get better, and as you've stated, the content is beatable without those ATs and there are workarounds. In fact, your second concept is already true: everyone can go and get a hold from START vendor in Pocket D mid-TF and still be able to complete it when dealing with the Green mitos. You just have to revoke your current AT-specific temp power first, then it will allow you to pick from any of them. The Taser Dart is the one with a chance to hold. There are other creative ways of dealing with Hami, too: Gravity Control's wormhole will move Hami out of the goo and Fold Space can, too. You'll be able to fight Hami completely away from the Mitos, if you so desire! Second, "spirit of not requiring specific classes and builds" is a personal preference, but doesn't seem to be a part of this game's design philosophy, nor the Homecoming team's. "It's not right that I should be forced to either bring a healer, build for def/resistances, or include a heal. So, I think the enemies shouldn't ever do damage." See the problem? If you make it so no mechanics play to any certain ATs strengths, it's also even less of a reason to bring less powerful ATs. Already, Controllers, Dominators, and Masterminds see significantly less play, especially in higher level content. So removing mechanics that play to their strengths (MMs excluded in this case) would just means those players feel even more excluded. What your suggestion reads as, to me and I would imagine at least a few others, is more akin to, "I want to never have to actively think about what I am doing, and just be able to attack and defeat things mindlessly. So make success guaranteed and make the win automatic."

Hey friends! I'm back with another hardmode guide! This one is for the 4star ITF, which can get very chaotic even for experienced teams! This guide covers the speedy approach to the Task Force with explanations of how to actually navigate each mission and why it's done that way in faster runs (such as avoiding Hostless encounters, maximizing Lore uptime, etc.). This is not the only way to approach a 4Star ITF. Please feel free to do any strategy you like. The only things that matter in 4Star content is that you are able to complete the task force and that you had fun/feel accomplished at the end. Builds don't matter and speed does not matter as long as everyone is having a good time. This is a game, after all! So if you do not want to do this approach, feel free to create your own, do it as a Kill-Most, etc. Just make sure your team is aware of what approach you are taking and that you give clear instructions as you go! Incan Locations/Instructions Helpful Binds/Targeting Macros I will be doing Aeon next! Please let me know what other content you would like to see, if you have any questions, and how I can help you be successful. Also, if anyone knows a more efficient way to stay alive on Brainstorm beyond just spamming Burnout >Barrier, please let me know 😄

Respectfully, that is irrelevant. If a leader is leading something and you don't like how they are leading, that doesn't give you or anyone else the right to do whatever you want. If I am leading a Hami in Abyss with the Hami rush method (ignoring mitos) and part of the league starts attacking mitos and ignores Hami, then those players are in the wrong. Period. Game rules or not, you (general you, not specifically you) are joining something someone else is leading. You want something done your way, then go lead your own SNS on Sunday nights and bring all the Kronos titans you want. But intentionally doing something that the leader has asked you to stop makes you the problem, not them asking you to stop.

Hey OP, I'm sorry you've had a rough experience with Corruptors! I do think you are right that you are missing the big picture. Hopefully this will help. As a result, this is unfortunately a very unfair comparison between Blasters and Corruptors, and it's flawed because it's using an incomplete picture to compare two ATs that have entirely different ways of accessing damage. They have fundamentally different approaches to DPS. Blasters just pump out very high raw damage numbers. Everything they do is about those raw numbers, and their only built-in ways to increase those numbers are with Build Up and Aim. Corruptors, however, find their damage in other ways, specifically through buffs and debuffs via their secondary set. Scourge is also a huge part of this and cannot be overlooked because if Corruptors had blaster damage numbers and got double damage after an enemy drops below 50% health, they'd be absolutely broken. The problem is that you are comparing the two ATs using only the factor that is a Blaster's biggest strength while ignoring the Corruptor's strengths, which inherently makes Corruptors look weak because with your criteria, Blasters get two offensive power sets to contribute to their damage, while, in terms raw damage numbers from offensive powers, Corruptors only have one offensive power set. This example should hopefully show what I mean: As a blaster, if I hit Build Up, Aim, and eat a bunch of Red Insps, I can cap my damage output at 400%. On my own, that is all I will ever be able to do. That's the ceiling. (I recognize that procs can bypass this ceiling a little bit, but that's a nonfactor since corruptors have access to the same procs). As a Corruptor, I can do the same thing via Aim in the primary set and chewing a bunch of reds, or if I'm Kinetics, I can cap my own damage just with fulcrum shift and enough enemies. My damage won't be as high as a Blaster until I start throwing out debuffs. The most effective way to bypass the damage cap is via debuff. I can cap my own and my team's damage output while also throwing out debuffs which make all of our attacks more likely to hit, lower their resistance, lower their regen, etc. AFAIK, debuffs are the only reliable way around the damage cap limitation. If your team needs more DPS, the correct answer isn't always "bring a blaster." The Blaster can only contribute their own individual DPS output to the team, but if you bring a Corruptor that not only can cap their own damage, but can also increase the damage output potential of 7 other players on their team? That one blaster's contribution is a lot smaller. One Blaster doing 50% more damage is worth less than all 8 team members each doing 300% more damage 😄 Also, before anyone brings up that Defenders have generally higher buff/debuff/heal values but the Scourge mechanic is ALSO what pushes Corruptors higher than Defenders, because while Defenders have better debuff values on their powers, the difference in those values is not enough to overcome the increased damage output Corruptors have via Scourge and higher base damage values. In other words, say a Defender can lower a target's resistance by 40%, whereas a Corruptor using the same power can only lower it by 30%. If the Corruptor is actually attacking, the damage it does, especially when Scourge kicks in, will more than make up for that gap in debuff value. Bonus points for anything that increases your team's to-hit chance, because your raw damage values mean nothing if you don't hit anything. This is going to be greatly oversimplified: Let's say an attack does 100 damage, but the enemy is 40% resistant to that attack's damage type. You fire it twice. One hit/one miss = 60 damage. Two hits = 120 damage. Zero hits = 0 damage. Repeat with the same values, but increase your damage by 400% and fire the same attack twice. (This is the limit of a Blaster). One hit/one miss = 240 damage. Two hits = 480 damage. Zero hits = 0 damage. Repeat with the same damage bonus, but -res debuffs make the enemy only 20% resistant to that damage type. (This would be the "limit" for a Corruptor, but the Corruptor has the added benefit of making this the "limit" for their entire team, too). One hit/one miss = 320 damage. Two hits = 640 damage. Zero hits = 0 damage. (Note: I sometimes suck at math, and may be slightly off in how resist affects the damage output here, but I am confident the base assertion is still true, was just trying to give some tangible values to the concepts I was explaining.) You can also test pretty much everything I've said in this post in a farm, and I'd be happy to do it myself, record it, and share it here, if you'd like! I suggest doing it in a farm since the Tank's gauntlet/taunt will keep enemies from scattering/aggroing onto the Corr or Blaster. Round 1: Go with a tank and a fire/fire blaster or an ice/fire blaster, herd two mobs together and see how long it takes to kill both mobs by attacking only with the blaster and whatever taunt/damage auras the tank has. Round 2: Repeat, but swap the blaster for a ice/ or fire/kin Corruptor. Round 3: Repeat, but swap /Kin for /Cold. Round 4: Bring all four, but don't let the corruptors attack, only let them use their buffs/debuffs and have the blaster and tank fight. I guarantee you rounds 2, 3, and 4 will all be faster times than the tank and blaster combo. Not only that, they will also be safer and have better sustain thanks to cold and kin buffs. Anyway, I hope this is helpful and gives you a better idea of the bigger picture in terms of damage output between ATs.

Either you are joking, to which I would say, "Well played," or you are teaming with some of the worst corruptors either build-wise or skill-wise. Kinetics heal is one of, if not the best in the game, and if people aren't getting healed, it's because they are out of position. A well-played /kin makes almost everything in the game a cake walk, relatively speaking. Both /cold and /kin raise the overall DPS of their team by either lowering stats of the enemy via debuffs or by literally increasing the damage % bonus via powers like Fulcrum Shift. Not only that, but they increase the resource sustain (end) for their team, so their team can fight for longer periods of time, too. I genuinely have no clue why your experience has been so bad, but if you play on Excelsior, I'll be happy to show you otherwise. Or I'll happily transfer to your shard and I will run with you. I'm in the midst of a private 4star event that is encouraging different types of 4star runs throughout the next 2 months. This would be considered the hardest content in the game, aside from specific challenges like Really Hard Way or MoKeyes. Of the 55 4star runs that have been done and tracked over just the last 2 weeks, Corruptors are the most used at 175 used, Defenders are #2 at 102 used, and Blasters are number 3 at 43 used. Put another way, after only two weeks, 40% of the toons brought have been Corruptors. Corruptors are easily the strongest AT in the game in team environments, with one well-played corruptor enabling your team to just shred through content. This gets even more insane when you discover that the Scourge mechanic effectively triples Blizzard's damage instead of doubling it.

Honestly, I don't know of many people doing it with any regularity, though I wouldn't classify myself as regular, either. lol Stendhal is the first one that comes to mind! He is a lot of fun to play with, very skilled at the game, and if you haven't seen entertainment until you've seen him farm on his water blaster 😄 Channel Link. I don't know if people realize that @Laucianna makes videos, but here is her channel. Lot of cool perspectives from the biggest Kheldian advocate PLUS one of the best leaders in the game, hands down.