Dogooder

I'm a returning player still new at the game. I'm currently playing a Storm Summoning /Storm Blast powerset Defender (lvl50+). I was excited about the new powerset and interested in playing a Defender. This post is a stream of consciousness post and I apologize for the disorganization. I broke up my paragraphs with number to try to provide quick reference points. The purpose in writing this is to say: I think END issues need to be addressing in this powerset. With that said, some of my thoughts so far. 1. Self-Heal needed. I think Storm Blast, o2 in particular, should have a self-heal aspect. It's a shame having to rely on inspirations to heal oneself. And it was frustrating and continues to be frustrating that I do not have a single power in a Storm/Strom set to heal myself so that I can continue to heal others. 2. END costs for core power-building powers can be problematic. I generally slot one damage enhancement and one of the P2W Dam/Recharge enhancements (thanks for making those free) when I have the space on a power. I found the solo combat (using the default mission setting (1/0)) to be long and unsatisfying as I would sometimes run out of END in more protracted fights and lose by dropped defenses. I honesty found it pitiful.. And teamed with another friend using Storm Blast, I'm not sure if it was primary and secondary, could become comical as we would both fight until we ran out of END and then were defeated, The END costs of laying down Storm Cell, Cat 6, Freezing raining and following up with support attack powers to try to do enough damage to remove an enemy set piece over and over again would drain my toon. And some individual powers like Gust are not powerful enough when not being used in the thematic Storm Cell build. 3. Low damage can be a problem And part of the reason the fights lasted so long was the lack of damage done by the powers. At first I was expecting my snipe power to be similar to the one on a blaster as a primary power and figured the lower class and different archetype led to different damage output which is my oversight and unfamiliarity with the archetype. The middling to seeming lower damage from the other powers was surprising, and with some confusing given the names of the powers. 4. Team play difficulties. And when used in a team setting the manual placement (and inability for the system to register my selections/clicks sometimes) of some of the cornerstone powers becomes hard to deploy with the mobs of toons, technical problems of the system not accepting my clicks, shifting camera angles to deploy cornerstone powers, or the speeds at which some team events happen. And the blaster click and blast fall back options (when dealing with fast teams) of Gale, Direct Strike (Hailstones Chain Lightning Cloudburst are good and have longer activation times which limit their availability) are underpowered damage-wise in my opinion. The small area of effect of the AOE powers and their longer cast times (Strom Cell and Cat. 5) can be an issue in fast moving team settings where the battlefield moves in seconds knocking out any damage multiplier for the low damage powers. Perhaps increasing the AOE sizes (or reducing casting times) is a simpler solution. 5. Set Design I believe I understand the power set purpose: Build increasing attacks around a deployed Storm Cell. When deployed properly it is a somewhat decent set. Individual powers (Gust, Jet Stream, Chain Lightning, and Cat 5) working out side of Storm Cell set came be less capable which I think can be an issue. I like the Storm Cell follows you as a pet does (centered on you I guess), can that be indicated in the game world or map? By a border or animation besides rain? 6. Animations are wonderful, but the game play is not. The animations are gorgeous and the description gave me the idea that I would be decimating foes via weather. And the reality has been a low damage de-buff set which leads to overly long battles when played as a secondary power. Quite underwhelming and frustrating. 7. Showing appreciation and frustration, as I want the set to be better, with the powerset I appreciate the new set. Solo play is painful and long because of END issues and low damage. Play with the set has been frustrating in solo play and embarrassing (running out of END, cast times for core powers resulting in casting after a battle is over, small AOE sizes, being ko'ed because of no self-heal, and underwhelming damage) in group play. Concerning group play; this undercuts the basic goal of my archetype, to defend teammates. It has not been fun overall, I would not recommend this power set in combo with Storm Summoning on a Defender (And I'm not crazy about Defender's from this experience). 8. Hailstones is a fun power. The chuck of ice that falls if procced is very satisfying, and enjoyable! Thank you! Thanks for taking the time to review this and for bringing CoH back.

Thank you so much for this.