InvaderStych

Count me in the camp that often will use this as an excuse to spend a session either soloing, or jumping on a team that's doing an arc/TF that I'm interested in on the toon I've decided to play at the moment. Additionally, I tend to consider myself not really good enough at the game in general to focus on maximizing my toon's contribution and concentrate on leading at the same time. This may or may not be true, but since various parts of my brain hate me I waste mental energy giving it thought. It's silly, lol. But here's the thing I discovered, bearing in mind I play Excelsior so the high pop might contribute to my experience. Outside of MO/Challenge runs, a few of the more difficult TF/SF's, iTrials, Hami Raids, and maybe MSRs because of the league size - the team leader doesn't necessarily need to be the person who knows the content best, or who's got the phattest set of macros, or the most efficient attack chain. There is just not a lot of content with complex mechanics to work around or that need involved tactics. 75-80% (estimate, don't burn me at the stake, lol!) can be played with pretty much whatever tactics a given player has found for the toon they've built. All I really need to do is be willing to recruit a group, pick what's going to be run, be familiar enough with the interface to swiftly deal with contacts/active mission selections, and pipe up in chat from time to time with things like "Left Side First," or "Great Work Everyone!" and such. I figured this out running the final assault on Mot for the first time. There's a lot going on in that mission, and even though I did a solo scout run and reset it I still wasn't in a position to "lead" it in any meaningful definition of the term. Seemed like it would be a good run for a team so I went for it. Worked out great. We didn't faceroll it, obviously because Ancients of Sorrow are brutal, but a solid run with bits of banter here and it seemed a good time was had by all. Here's my thing. I've only played two games that are MMOs; this one and the Old Republic SW one from ~10 years ago. The latter I only played because it was a gift from a buddy who thought he was going to get into it deeply (he didn't) and because it was achingly beautiful to look at. I was done with it pretty swiftly. So, as a resident of the City who doesn't have a deep history or experience with MMOs, the "reputation" that the genre has garnered when it comes to "endgame" and "raids" and the like can be ... let's see ... intimidating isn't the right word. What's a single word way to say "Off-Putting?" The Cynical Misanthrope and the Anxiety Monster in my brain get together and start talking about this when I think about leading something, and I have to sternly remind them that - thankfully - that sort of gamer is rare to the point of irrelevance among this wonderful community. Every time I've decided to round up a team it's been just fine, or usually even better! The only real complainer I can recall in my year here so far was someone who was kinda out of line anyway. I might even get crazy one day and try leading things more that are more involved than the TFC set and DA teams, lol.

Excellent descriptions so far. Couple of notes ... Writing up a bind to <shift>-s for Combat Teleport to port you backwards a moderate distance is a great way to maximize Leap's mechanics, both the damage buff and the collection of Frenzy stacks. These are from my blaster (fire/martial), and I haven't tuned the distances for Savage as both of my Savage toons are taking a break while I obsess over my new toy. lshift+w "powexec_location forward:55 combat teleport" lshift+a "powexec_location left:35 combat teleport" lshift+s "powexec_location back:40 combat teleport" lshift+d "powexec_location right:35 combat teleport" Leap, owing to it's proc-a-bility is where I like to drop the +50% proc. Near as makes no difference to a guaranteed proc firing off on the power one is usually using to open. Leap also has interesting interactions with Double-Hit (Hybrid Assault Radial), Bopper has a thread on Hybrid in the guides section where I posted what I noticed on my Brute. Despite the favorable proc rate, this is not everyone's placement of choice though, so ymmv and all that fun caveat like stuff.

Thanks for the verification. It was not immediately apparent to me that the text within the spoiler tag was limited to the stalker changes or something that reached more broadly.

So, to make sure I understand this, I should not expect dramatically lower damage from GPB on my Scrapper because those are Crit Scales for Stalkers and not Damage Scales for the powers listed in that spoiler tagged list? On second glance it looks like a mix of both. Further, am I correct that these changes apply only to Stalkers, or do they also apply to Scrappers? It might be good to make that more clear, seeing those numbers at glance they can easily be mistaken for something they're not. Especially since, if I am reading Jimmy's post up-thread correctly, they weren't in the beta notes.

Shield. Customize to the "Energy" version (or lightning if that is more to taste) and match colors to the attacks. Mine is a scrapper, very durable; GPB when AAO is saturated and Insight is up is a lot like throwing a moon at someone's face. Shield Charge also bolsters AoE, but with SC/ML as the two main tools my scrapper shines a lot more against hard targets than big groups - the KU/KD is great soft control though and on team the opposing minions rarely matter anyway. Might not work thematically for you like /WP if the character's shields don't have a physical manifestation like the attacks do, but it is a good combo. 🙂

Fair enough. I hadn't considered connecting the two, all I remembered was the jousting issue. Thanks for answering plainly.

Thank you for this clarification, but what was the rational for it's implementation in PvE?

I could be mistaken about the "just for," but I do remember being put off pvp when it happened. I don't remember there being a PVE rational, but I vaguely remember that SS/SJ jousting (providing some sort of perceived or actual advantage) was one of the original stated reasons. Either way, I do wonder why it is still around in one space but not the other.

Something occurred to me this morning. Why is there still Travel Suppression in PVE? TS was added in the early days of PVP, for PVP, and has since been stripped from PVP - or is at least possible to strip the constraint from matches. Why are we still clinging to it in PVE?

This is the closest I've seen around here: IDK about running it real-time, but I have been meaning to mess around with it a bit.

That's pretty easy to accidentally do. I sometimes play very early AM PST, and I still managed to accidentally disrupt one that was just starting up one of the few times I've tried pylon testing. Watching the DMG/Combat chat tabs means not seeing Broadcast, LFG, or even Tells sometimes. Is there a reliable way to get private Pylons so that doesn't happen?

Tinted Dark Armor (Tank, Brute, Scrap, Sent) makes for a decent "Nano Swarm" look if you want to go that route. Something with /Devices could be written that way as well.

Stop. Spying. On. Me. 😛

Wasn't Fly originally slower by design because it is the simplest method? One can basically auto-pilot across a zone, carry enough altitude and you're effectively untouchable. SS users have to take corners, navigate valleys, jump over every little pebble in the street, and so on. SJ previously netted the fastest crossings for me, but still required user thought/input, and occasionally easy to snag yourself on something. If we're talking about being in a Zone way above a Toon's given Pay Grade, then Fly is just about the safest method there is - with some zone exceptions, naturally. If we balanced all of the travel powers to the same speed cap, then by the metric above (time to mission door), Flight would win every time simply via obstacle avoidance. Which does pose the question; do we want travel powers to have matching speed caps, matching "end result when usability is factored (ie, balance all speeds so that all travel users arrive in similar times inclusive of obstacle avoidance), or do we want them to all have individual flavors: advantages and disadvantages included? Genuinely asking. 🙂

The White Buffalo - BB Guns & Dirt Bikes

You mean adding toxic as a defense type? Possibly. I was trying to think of all of the nasty damage patches that were added as iTrials were released, but many of those are untyped, unresistable, both, or worse, lol. I don't think any of those are Toxic either.

This. Drop the Hami if you are tight on slots and the Blue Bar is in a happy place, which running /Rad is a non-issue. Technically one can drop dmg procs into it as well, but that's not necessarily an efficient use of slots, funny to watch with 4 of them in place but not really great dps/slot cost in practice.

Me either. Even Arachnoid attacks have a positional component, right?

Can't say I've felt the envy personally, but after rolling my first Blaster here on HC just yesterday and being a melee-centric player all these years (never had anything but scraps and brutes at 50) I can honestly say this Fire/Martial might just be some of the most fun I've had going from 1-18 since the game was new. Add the massive dmg to the fun factor and I can see where the envy could be very strong indeed! Thanks to all for the tips in this thread! Blap-Jousting FTW. Now if I can just remember that I'm not carrying half a dozen or more protective toggles maybe I'll spend less time looking for spare change on the floor. 🤣

Ok, yes. I figured I was missing a piece of the puzzle. You are correct; unless you're monitoring def in a window (and can safely surmise nothing else is changing def values like debuffs), or have combat attributes open to that section (for those of us fortunate enough to have that sort of screen real estate) then yes, the Details Tab for Stealth doesn't split the In/Out differences for Defense. I could be mistaken, but Stealth isn't the only power who's Details tab doesn't keep up with those sorts of changes. @UberGuy makes an important point. Descriptions, being static text, could only offer base (unmodified, not real-time) numbers for the power, and the Details tab is the spot for more "in practice" numbers on the power (Level slider, calcs enhancement values, etc). Personally, from a "design" standpoint I like that Descriptions are "Flavor" and Details are "Details," but I don't see the harm in writing base values into Descriptions, assuming they would be described as such so as not to confuse new players. However, more realistically with the resources available to the HC team, I'd rather see the Details tabs for various powers fixed and editing the static Descriptions getting a lower priority.

Am I missing something? Numbers, granting inconsistency and sometime inaccuracy, are available in the Details pane of Power Info. So, maybe not in the Descriptions, but one tab over? What is being asked for here?

Yup. This appears to be working in a very brief test. They're triggering simultaneously at what unscientifically looks to be about the expected rate. (Edit) Which is to say occasionally one or the other will fire of the two I had slotted, while occasionally they double-up on the same tick of the clock. When you first slot them they're fire on separate clock ticks, and they sync up when you zone.

You misspelled Scrapper. 😉

Thanks. So if you'll indulge another theoretical question; when that change goes into effect what should be the expected behavior of PT:%Heal in a click pbAoE like Energy Absorption (Ice Armor; seems to be auto-hit if I am following logs properly)? Pretty sure I just answered my own question on Beta. Looks like this piece triggers on power activation in a click, ignoring # of targets hit in an AoE and just firing once. Which, I'm guessing, is something the rest of you already knew. 😄

I should probably learn to make savory corn bread, for nostalgia. But I do try to mimic the blueberry corn muffins that I used to get at the shop across from a former workplace long, long ago. All I do though is multiply the recipe on the box by 1.5 (yup, 3 eggs instead of 2, everything else 1.5x) and add a bunch of blueberries. Done. 😄