Diantane

In that case I'll log on with my other account or maybe make a 3rd, 4th or 10th. By the way. How many of the trolls on this post actually play the game? I've heard from some that said they haven't played in years.

Actually I was online with a team on Friday evening for 7 hours and 22 minutes straight. Not farming. We were doing arcs in Striga, IP and TV

Can remember the LFG chat area being extremely busy a couple years ago. Today even at peak times there's barely a message going by. I figured that it would pick up over the weekends. Not anymore. So I look at the server population. Here it is Monday morning. Not going to be many on at this time. Maybe a couple hundred on Excelsior. Then I look at the population of other MMO's this morning: World of Warcraft 325,612 Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn 447,398 Baldur's Gate III: 310,204 Old School RuneScape: 272,713 Path of Exile: 176,929 Warframe: 168,712 There are hundreds of mmo's these days and the gaming population of the world have moved on to the most popular of them. Twenty five years ago, there were only three mmo's - Asheron's Call, Sierra Online and Everquest I used to make a new character (alt) on COH and get others to run the arcs. I'd be level 50 in 2-3 days. This Saturday and Sunday evening I can't find one player. Unless you play solo, this emulator is done for most.

Thought that this was a good idea for a defense: that foes in melee range would attack others instead of yourself. But it only worked for a second or two in low level areas of the Hollows. Even with two accuracy single origin enhancements on it, it never worked again. Had to re-spec it out.

That takes 2-3 hours. My way takes 60-75 minutes (the 'fastest" way to 19). I've done dfb hundreds of times and never gotten to level 8 unless you do it twice (takes too long).

Young controllers against +4 foes have a tough time actually landing a hold power on them. Unless they have at least two Single Origin accuracy \ enhancements on ever controlling power. Almost every young player that I've spoken to don't use enhancements at all until level 25. I always start using SO's at level 7.

Went through my alts and found a level 14 brute. By the looks of his missions he was doing KR stuff. Once they get to 19 or 20 I can level them fairly quickly, but at this level its gonna be slow. So I abandoned him and restarted a new brute with the same primary and secondary. Led a team on "Death from Below" which gets you to level 6 or 7 and a minor buff (I always take endurance). Then I go to the Hollows and lead a team through two outside and two inside missions at +2. Then we do the Flux missions at +3 (Frostfire at +4). This gets you to level 19 (in about an hour - if you don't have a team with more than one controller) and there are lots of good missions from here. Note: Did Frostfire once with four controllers on the team. It took 4.5 hours to complete. Never again.

Leveled a rad/ice tank doing arcs with teams up to 50. This tank would jump into any group and live without any issues. I've read that Super Strength is better for this because of Foot Stomp, but i beg to differ. Frozen Aura does the same amount of damage as FS (just cold vs smash). Plus with my constant Ice Patch, most foes around me keep falling down instead of hitting me. Anyway I tried it in an AE smash/lethal mission and it was easy. I don't have any special build. No sets,. No incarnates yet and just single origin enhancements.

Not gonna quit just yet. Gonna hang in there a little longer. Played mostly ranged alts and now been working with melee. About to make a new stalker (ice/fire). My last alt was a defensive tank that could run into a group no matter the size and take the alpha for team (rad/ice). This was the most successful tank I've played and my third one the same way on different servers. Just reduced the amount of times on coh for a while. As you said, I don't want to get burned out.

Have you ever heard of or or played the game called, "Satisfactory?" I've got over 5,000 hours into that game. About as much as I have in this game. I'm gonna hang in here a while longer. But now just play a couple hours on the weekday evenings and on weekends. During the other times I play Satisfactory and a few other games. Lots of time when you're retired 🙂

I see that players will leave looking for more XP elsewhere as you said, but when I start a new alt, I'm in my mid thirties after 6-7 hours just doing story arcs. More XP? They miss out if they leave.

Realize that there are many combinations for alts that you can choose from, but in the last 5 years, I've created 208 alts on this server. Most over 40. About two dozen 50's. It's getting real hard coming up with a new alt. I play many hours each day so I'm done with that alt in 3-4 days. Every time I come up with a new idea for an alt, I do a search and there they are already -- level 40-50. Can't grind 50's (A.D.D.). I know some of you would like me to leave COH anyway 🙂

There's a mission in the Agent Watkins arc where you have to kill hundreds of Freakshow. Young players will get 2-3 levels there. But sometimes there's one player that will kill the mission by infiltrating to the end and click on the finishing glowie. I look forward to that mission for the large XP. Hate it when it ends prematurely.

When my team is made up of all vets (usually happens Saturday mornings), everyone clears all missions regardless when the blue exit button appears

Whenn my tea

Would to-hit debuffs SO's be any help?

When the mission objective is completed and the BLUE exit button appears, it does not mean exit the mission ASAP. It just means that the first objective is met. But if the team is in the middle of a fight, stay and help. Besides, missions are a way to give you XP so you can level more often. That's better then rushing to the next mission just so you can wait for everyone to get there. A good rule of thumb is, watch the leader and do what they do. If the leader leaves, you should too. If the leader stays and is fighting, stay and help them. ~ Thanks for your time

Thanks

Got Musculature for 33% more damage, but can't see the bonus in the Combat Attributes. Is it listed elsewhere?

You answered my questions and didn't even know it. Thanks

Thank you

Two powers I used were Irradiated Ground and Beta Decay. Now I read what they did on MIDS, but there is really no way to tell it they are doing anything. Had both of them running and had acc, end redux x 2 in irradiated ground and three to-hit debuff and end redux SO's in beta decay. They seemed to be hitting me pretty well (died many times on the way to 40). I did notice a 4 damage on all foes that surrounded me. But mostly I noticed the endurance use of these two powers 😞

My little brother once told me, "Why don't you just play the game like everyone else?" Its not me. I like to figure out the math behind the character. Back when we were playing Asherons Call, My brother, his friends and I went into a high level dungeon. My level was much lower than theirs. We were attacked by a large mob and most everyone died. They were standing by the "lifestone" talking about the battle. Then my brother noticed that I wasn't among them. He asked where I was. Told them that I didn't die. That I was still in the dungeon having fun with the creatures (fooling them because I understood their AI (artificial intelligence).

After making 208 alts, I play this game much less than when I was new to it. Its getting mighty hard to come up with a character that I haven't played yet.

I'm not just looking at this from the outside. I have played a couple dozen Corruptors, but was let down by their low damage. Then checked out MIDS to understand why my attacks were so weak. When I'm trying to solo a boss with great difficulty and then another player comes up and one shots them, I know something's up. When Corruptor's were created the dev's figured that they couldn't make them like a blaster with buffs as that would be OP. So they make them weak with a buff. I've played Kinetic Defenders that reached the damage cap between levels 42-50. Tried to do the same on a Corruptor, but it was impossible.