TygerDarkstorm

I never said every character needs to be fully optimized. I'm not a min/max player. However, a dedicated healer is just not a needed thing and I think you're missing what we mean when we say "dedicated healer" as it applies to this game. A "dedicated healer" is someone like the OP--a person who usually picks empathy and picks pretty much only the powers from the empathy powerset, and often dips into the medicine pool for even more heals, and then contributes nothing else to a team because they're waiting for green bars to move. Yes, even in a duo that's useless and wasting one half of the duo's time. Whereas if that same empath were to actually pick up some of their attacks and offensive powers, now they can fill time in between buffs/debuffs/healing with attacks. Sure, they may not do much damage, but the faster mobs are dying, the safer everyone is anyway. And yes, this applies to running in a duo as well; in fact, I would think it would be even more prevalent in a duo. And for the other people trying to say that healing is necessary and yada yada--we know. We have never said that healing cannot be useful. I have a water/pain corr who once spent a good chunk of a TF healing instead of using her attacks because for whatever reason the team was quite squishy. Healing has its place, but it should never be the only thing you focus on. @Nemu summed things up quite nicely in their post and their description of how to play empathy is what I aspire to be on my pain defender; but that doesn't mean I don't also take my attacks and slot them.

Because, as mentioned by myself and others, this game doesn't require, need, or desire dedicated healers, not even on MSR's. You should be doing more than heal and waiting for green bars to move.

As someone who used to main a "pure" empathy defender back in the days when those were viable and somewhat desirable (though never with the medicine pool because lol what?) (leveling up pre-IO era), I have not really touched the powerset since I've returned to the game, specifically for the reasons Sir Mishkin outlined in his post, so I won't reiterate what's been said. If I were to run empathy again, it would probably be on a controller, corruptor or MM, with focus on bringing all my other tools to the party and not just my healing. What some people new to this game, and possibly some returning players, seem to not realize with CoX is that dedicated healers are just not a thing or not needed in this game. If you are only focused on healing, even at the lower levels where it's more useful/desirable, you're being a bit of a hindrance to your team. My thermal/sonic defender may not put out a lot of damage, but I am rarely just sitting around waiting for people to get hurt. I am applying/reapplying shields, finding the hardest target and smacking them with debuffs, forging my damage dealers, and then shouting at things to amplifying my team's damage and help kill things faster. Chances are I end up missing a heal because most people can take care of themselves that I'm rarely watching green bars anyway. At level 46 I'm still a little undecided how I feel on the character as a whole and worry about her not being useful, but I still like to bring her out from time to time. I also have a baby pain defender in the works, though I decided to go fire primary on her for concept/bit more damage--which I now realize means she may be better as a corr, lol. Once you get out of the "I need to be a dedicated healer" mindset, I find that support characters have become a lot more fun. I have been trying a lot of different sets I haven't before, and take and slot my attacks so that I am doing something to contribute to the team outside of my buffs/debuffs/heals. And sometimes it's fun to be on a support toon that doesn't heal at all, like cold, TA, poison (has a heal, but it's not very good), etc.

I have not really heard that before. Most people I see talking about them consider them pretty tanky, which is one of the reasons that they pair nicely with /kin. They're not a top tier set, which is fine, but they don't suffer the way mercs or ninjas do. I'm not sure where you're getting this from, but it doesn't fit not just my personal experience with beasts, nor that of other avid beast/ players on these forums/reddit. The thread was provided last page, but I'll link it here to provide some raw data to back up my point:

But beasts don't actually underperform? Like, there's a whole thread dedicated to testing out the MM primaries and beasts were a long way from underperforming. I know that was in a specific environment and such, but I know I'm not the only beast MM player who agrees that their damage isn't as anemic as a lot of people make it out to be, especially when paired with /kin.

Actually, after checking my calendar, I would like to keep my spot for this Saturday, please. Next Saturday I won't be able to make it since I have to get blood work done.

If you have something ready to go, feel free to take my spot. 🙂 I've done a few of these as it is and don't mind giving up my spot this time around for you. But yeah, we're usually deciding theme and which TF/SF to do while we're raiding on Saturdays, so the sign-ups happen shortly after the raid.

I mean, I sort of did when I said that some of a blaster's hardest hitting attacks are their melee abilities.... I may not be as into the number crunching and such as some of the other forum users, but I made my initial post based on a lengthy amount of reading from those whose knowledge exceeds mine. A blaster is intended to deal damage, period. Maybe they started off intended to be ranged primarily, but the game evolved past that point, and if you look at even the abilities in the primaries, a great many of them need you to be in melee range or close to it. The T9 nukes for example--they are now crashless and one of the strongest hitting powers blasters have; they are also PBAoE so you need to be in the middle of the mob to use them. Given how sturdy blasters can be built these days, there is very little reason for them not to blap when the time calls for it unless it's for character, thematic, and/or personal reasons. What the game manual said in 2004 doesn't mean much to where the game was at when it shut down in 2012, and where it's at now in 2020. Both blasters and dominators should learn to feel comfortable jousting in and out of melee.

Demons/storm is an absolute blast! I don't remember which user it was, but as someone on these forums put it, it's like bringing forth the apocalypse. 😄

Well, I went off of @nihilii's suggestion to just let the demons worry about healing themselves, and resummon them as needed. Now, I'm not great at building toons, so take my opinions with a grain of salt. I frankly didn't think demons/cold was the god-killer a lot of people have made it out to be--I feel a lot more powerful on my demons/storm toon leveling up, but like I said, I think that has a lot to do with demons/cold being more of an end-game build that benefits heavily from IO's. Again, that's just my experience. Cold's shields are primarily defense, yes, but that doesn't make them bad for demons. Gives them a bit more of a layered protection. And really, if you're choosing cold, it's more because the debuffs are so powerful vs. the shields being good--the shields are just a bonus. Demons/Thermal is also a strong combo. Thermal has heals, shields, and a couple of great debuffs that can be used to take on AV's solo if that's your thing. I tried it, I found it a little boring for my tastes, but it is a tried and true pairing. Great set for if you don't mind not doing much and micro-managing pets, and a welcome addition to teams. (I have a necro/thermal and beast/thermal MM and thermal/sonic defender, so I have nothing against the set xD) Again, I'm by no means an expert. I just really love MM's, have probably a dozen of them at various levels, and read a lot about them here and on reddit. I've been debating about trying a demons/nature MM to see how that plays out. Edit: Also, I think once I27 hits, Demons/Trick Arrow will be worth taking a look at. Doesn't have a heal, but demons heal themselves and the debuffs TA brings should help them kill things faster. I tried a bots/TA on beta for a bit that felt nice to play.

I have a demons/cold and demons/storm that are both survivable solo and a lot of fun. Demons/cold was a little squishy through the leveling process, but once you get the 32 upgrade and the demons get all their buffs and heals, things start to level out some. Definitely seems to need slotting to get really beastly as my level 50 barely slotted demons/cold is no AV/GM killer yet. I have a baby necro/nature MM that's level 17ish that seems like it should be fun as I keep going on her. Necro/Thermal is good too, but a bit dull; I recommend taking personal attacks/pool powers if you go that route.

My new blaster, Dual Pistols/Ninja. Her name is Azul Dragon. Even though most of the look is just the sinister costume set, I still got a tell tonight saying her name and look are cool. 🙂

@TraumaTrain As tempted as I am do do a necro/nature, I'm gonna go ahead and bring the debuffs with Botanical Pathogen, my plant/poison Controller 🙂

I'm not familiar enough with most of the TF's/SF's in the game to really make a suggestion; I'm down for anything. And if it's something I can't reach level for in time, I will step aside for the week. 🙂 I can't decide whether I want to bring a necro/nature MM, plant/poison troller, or plant/martial dom. 😅

Just want to let you guys know, I'm online and in Steel Canyon; just want to go grab a shower real fast.

On the Character Select screen, there is a little icon on the top right near the delete character button that looks like a pencil. Select the character whose name you want to change, then click that and rename them.

@TraumaTrain I'll be there next Saturday on Cyber Sprite, an elec/shield stalker.

@TraumaTrain I look forward to seeing what you have up your sleeve, Rich!

I won't be there. Gonna be busy all day that day. I should be able to join again next weekend. 🙂

Was gonna say the same thing. Despite the misconception and the character creator labeling them as ranged, blasters are the masters of ALL damage, as Apparition said. Some of the strongest hitting blaster powers are their melee abilities. And it's fairly easy to build a blaster to be tough enough to survive in melee these days.

I haven't been able to put hours into this yet, and I'm by no means a hardcore player, min/maxer, or number cruncher or anything, but I love the concept of TA and wanted to go play around with it on the beta. I opted for a bots/TA MM as I have yet to make a TA MM (for obvious reasons on "live"). I figured the bots would be pretty tanky, they have some self heals and bubbles, so seemed like a safe pick to try out the new TA. Starting her out at level 20, with the MM ATO's and some basic IO's, and still only on basic mission settings. So far I like the feel of the set with the bots; damage is a little slow, but I feel as if the debuffs are helping the bots kill mobs faster. I really like the feel of the changes to TA so far. I have a demons/cold MM at 50 that can be a pretty devastating combo, but I wonder now with these changes how beasts/TA and demons/TA will fare.

Zapparilla Elec/Elec Blaster Slobber Hound Water/Regen Sentinel (the pinkish "slime" is supposed to be like she's drooling; went pinkish as if she had just eaten or something) Glitch in the System ElecAff/Dual Pistols Defender Dark Shifter Dark/Atomic Blaster (related to the other Shifter characters I've posted/created) Thundrassa Dark/ElecAff Controller Miss Fade Illusion/Traps Controller (going for a spy/James Bond theme with her) Pixielated Ice/Time Controller Frostie Pixie Ice/Nature Corruptor

I'm going to have to pull out (lol) of this weekend's Themed SF. My cousin's baby boy is turning 1 and having his birthday party at noon on Saturday, so I'll be busy with that that day. 🙂 Good luck to you all though!

You pulled that out of a post discussing level 50+, end game, incarnate content, where it's true; of course it doesn't apply to every level of the game. The other levels where those buffs are useful was not the discussion at hand nor @DSorrow's point.

I agree. I know HC is a small team, but typically people have different talents/specialties, and we know that @Piecemeal is currently creating new content to release with Page 6, but I do not believe that they are also working on game balance.