Diantane

Yes, but you have to look at Dom melee vs Blaster ranged. Sentinels got some love a few months ago and boy did they ever -- 1.100 vs 1.125 on a Blaster? I have 8 blasters and 72 sentinels (see the trend?)

Okay, why are Dominators telling me they do DPS just like a Scrapper or Blaster?

I've been playing COH since the first hour of LIVE. The team is assembled, they stand right before the enemy and then they freeze. Waiting for something that will start the battle. Its like they are waiting for someone else to do something. Starting the "Alpha" attack which will harm that player beyond belief. I've seen this and decided to do something about it. To create an "Alpha Tank" that will immediately jump into a group of baddies and be able to take plenty of punishment. These tanking players do the same on other mmo's, but there the healer is standing by ready to aid the tank. In this game its rarely that organized. So the tank that I create has to be defensive enough to take a beating without much help from the rest of the team. Tried many combinations of tanks and kept failing. They had no staying abilities. So I created a list of goals: 1) High endurance recovery 2) Lower endurance use 3) Very high defense 4) Very high health Tried Invul and it was a very good defense, but ran out of endurance quickly and all of the defensive toggles dropped. The same with Super Reflexes. The best defense I tried was Radiation. Not only is the defense high, but they get the essence of two stamina's with Gamma Boost, a very high absorption (1,100 with single origin enhancements at 50) with Particle Shielding, a negative to-hit buff with Beta Decay, a substantial heal with Radiation Therapy and a emergency defense with very little loss when it ends with Meltdown. As they say, your best defense is a good offense. I found that Ice Melee gives you the best "defense." Using Ice Patch keeps most from touching you. With two recharge reduction enhancements and Hasten, I can keep up to two patches going at once; casting another in 2-3 seconds. And Frozen Aura does just as much AoE damage as Foot Stomp does with Super Strength. Except all of my other attack powers slow the enemy down and accept a "Slow" enhancement. In first creating this tank, I chose only defense powers with my first attack power at level 10 (Taunt) and my second at level 20 (Ice Patch). My third attack power came at level 30 -- tier 9's Frozen Aura. But by then I had all of my defenses including Tough and Weave. After that I filled in with the other secondary powers. I also trained Leadership's Maneuvers and Tactics so I could see through "blindness." As well as Teleportation to get Fold Space so I could tighten up nearby groups. I've been working with this 50 vet often and he's definitely a team pleaser.

I've been hosting teams for 4.6 years. When I call DPS players, I will sometimes get a Dom calling in. But the attacks of a Dom are their secondary powers (about 25% (not 5%) less powerful than a Primary attack. That would be like a Defender training a ton of their secondary blasts and think that they are a Blaster. Or a Tank training their weak secondary attacks thinking that they are a scrapper or brute with more armor and health. So Dom's are not like a Blaster, Scrapper, Brute, Stalker, Sentinel, Kheld or Soldier. A MM primary is damage, but I've only seen a few that do much DPS. They definitely need some balancing.

Well that's a switch. I go talk with Borea and she acts like she's never seen me before (have done at least 75 missions with her already - they did say they were impressed with me for what I've done so far). She tells me to go kill 10 ritki and I do. Then she sends me to talk with Gussian who leads me to Dark Watcher, then The Grey Lady and then to Levantera who gives me missions. No idea why it didn't work before. Oh also got a badge that allows me to collect Vanguard Merits. Finally something.

Thanks and no. Not a badge hunter - lol. I see badges as an achievement with no reward except those that aid your Long Distance Teleport Accolade.

I spoke with Levantera, but all she does is introduce Borea Serphent Drummer tells me to talk with Levantera Gaussian send me to Levantera or Borea. Now when I do Borea, she always gives me two missions. I've always selected the second mission since the first one is on all contacts is to kill 15 Outcasts or others. You do enough of them and the team breaks apart. I'll try doing the first mission selection. The second one is just a grind. So it all stems from Borea, before you can move on.

I had never been to this section before. Finally found it as well as Dark Watcher, but he just tells me to talk with someone else. Not interested in doing an infinite amount of repetitive missions for Borea, so now I'm at a standstill. She has zero rewards anyway. So now my only choice is to grind PI Portals (which I hate and will never do again). So either find something in RWZ (or other place) or go play another game.

Thanks for that. Will explore further. My team left RWZ last night and did a couple arcs in Night Ward, but that ran out so I'll be investigating RWZ again.

Doc Buzzsaw's level range is 35-39. Probably won't talk to a 46

Tried to find the Dark Watcher, but he appears to be underground (possibly in the sewers).

I found the ringing payphone and get nothing either by double clicking or one long press. Guess you have to be 50 to access it.

Trying to find the those arcs now -- not interested in another evening of grinding.

According to Wiki she only has ten missions. Well she may only have ten, but she repeats them over and over again. Started there at level 41 and now 46. No end, no badges and no merits. You may as well grind the senseless radio missions.

Clicked on the link, That's funny. I used to do other arcs in RWZ besides Borea. Don't think this one is a real arc. They keep repeating missions a lot. Seems endless too. It's just grinding (boring).

I read in the last update that there would be new story arcs in RWZ. Has anyone experienced them yet? I solo them the first time to learn the story and then host teams so they can experience them too, but I have no idea where to go. Any ideas?

Ifs fairly easy to get a large number of merits when you are 50, but they are harder for low level players to get. So I discovered a way to get 90 merits, a few hundred thousand influence and 13 levels in two to three hours time. At level 1 join a Death From Below trial. You'll get to level 6 or 7 in ten minutes @ double XP. Then go to the Hollows and get the Wincott and Flux Story Arcs but right about the time you get the last mission from Flux, "Frostfire", you will reach level 14. Its very important to watch this as you must turn off your XP in the Options as you can't go over 14 in order to get the next two arcs (Julius the Troll and Valshak the Mystic). When you reach the end of Valshak, you will have 90 merits. Note: when you reach 14 and turn off your XP, delete your double XP buff so you can get influence. Once you finish these arcs, go ahead and turn your XP back on. If you are soloing the last two arcs, you should lower the dif to -1/1. Since you're not getting any XP and you will get through it faster.

I'd say if you wanted to go afk, doing so right at the ouro portal is a bad idea as travelers are trying to click on the portal and can't because so many are blocking it

Some of the teams that I host have been made up of all defenders. For some reason the huge amount of buffs, debuffs and protections makes this team rock through mobs pretty fast. I'm surprised more defender teams aren't around. Trivia; When LIVE first started, two RAD defenders with the same debuffs on a boss would allow anyone to kill it with one simple "brawl." This was nerfed two weeks later.

No, its not the chicken and the egg... Why do so many players go to the ouroboros and then just stand there all day? Could they possibly run away from the portal so travelers can actually see it to click on?

When I made a defender I have to train the first attack, but after using it in DFB for a half down levels, Its's removed from the toolbar and I concentrate on my primaries. I have a 50 pain/rad defender. Its best blast with 3-SO damage enhancements does 3 x 30 (big deal! ). The only defender I have that does any real damage is a kin/beam 50. All the other ones are very weak damage. A defender's blast are a secondary power and they don't crit. I tried dual pistols on a Sentinel and it took me almost two minutes to kill anything during Frostfire. I can't imagine training DP on a defender - lol.

I bet

With the long cooldowns on most of your powers, it seems like most of your time would be spent waiting.

Doing Frostfire at +4 allows a player at level 14 to advance to 19 in less than an hour + time for wipes. A wipe happens mostly because the PUG team is full of inexperienced players. They would normally play at +0 but all of them want to be 19 fast. After the first hour of players quitting and re-recruiting, and then playing until they level, it becomes easier. After they level twice, everything gets very easy and fast. I have done Frostfire at no difficulty before and it was dead boring (never again). To make it easier for the players, we do the first two indoor missions at +1, then Flux at +3. So Frostfire at +4 is just a little harder.

Update: Well that plan didn't come to fruition. There were no mid-level players online (well one controller). Just 50+ and a few lowbies. I'll try again tomorrow. My handle is "Diantane" on Excelsior