AerialAssault

Paragon Chat wasn't popular because there wasn't a game to actually play, don't make stuff up. There's a tonne of stuff to do in this game. Just because you don't get a big gold crown saying how great you are doesn't mean there is no content.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't feel that we should be using Pylon tests as a benchmark for developing any set. The data can certainly be useful, but most people aren't soloing Pylons. As I said, during my own tests I never once thought "Ugh god this damage is terrible.", I thought "Wowaza, I just dusted that guy in two hits.". I wasn't trying anything high tier or outrageous. Just playing the game as I normally would.

Yeah, Jim puts it right. Homecoming is in a unique position where, with regards to appearance & costumes, there are no "haves" and "have nots". We all have the same costumes available, so everyone has equal opportunity to look their best. I would rather not upset this. If you want bragging rights, collect badges. That's literally what they are for.

I want to be honest, I never felt like I had issues stunning enemies on any AT. Yeah, sure, maybe I couldn't keep 1 Boss consistently CC'd, but you know what I could do? Completely discombobulate them with very high burst damage. Which I think is a fair trade-off.

Genuine question to those who want unlockable costume pieces: Why is a badge not enough?

Blue Steel kicked my dog.

I think some kind of system whereby a contact exemplars you down to the maximum level of that contact would go a long way for a lot of people.

So, I got back from doing some very quick and not very extensive tests with an Energy Melee/Bio Armour Stalker. I built them with a 'budget' build, using no Very Rares & only a few rare sets. No Incarnate powers. I was running some +2/x4 w/ Bosses missions. Not a very high bar, but I was testing it against my 'normal' and not against the higher bars of others. I very rarely play +4/x8 solo on any character so it's not something I'd bother to do. My conclusion is that it does an insane amount of single-target damage. Build-Up -> Assassin's Strike -> Total Focus -> Energy Transfer is a rotation that can destroy a +3 Boss with little difficulty. Power Crash is effective at thinning the mob through stuns and just pure damage (although I am aware that will be getting tweaked, for the best I feel.) I would have to disagree with the calls for Total Focus + Energy Transfer to deal full Critical damage. Even without it, it's still an absolutely eye-watering amount of damage to throw out in a short period of time. You also have to consider on a Stalker that you also have your quick firing Assassin's Strike, which can crit, and is effectively a faster Total Focus that doesn't Hold the enemy. If they had three Extreme damage attacks that could crit, what could possibly pose a threat? And let's not forget that all of these powers have relatively short cooldowns. I feel that this would tip the balance of power too far into Energy Melee's favour. NOW, that being said .. as I have already mentioned, I would be interested to see what life would be like if they could crit for the full amount. You know, just to see what it could do.

I've tried it on a /Rad Brute with a Basic IO build, no sets. I was doing the new arc with a friend at level 39, and I was throwing out ~550 ET's while near max Fury, more than enough to cripple a Boss or delete a Minion/LT. It's not too hard to imagine what a fully kitted out, damage capped Brute could do with Energy Transfer.

In addition there's also a buff that appears on your buff bar. And even though I just got done testing it, I think there's also red text that says "Energy Stored" beneath the buff bar, but I honestly can't remember.

I think the thing to take into account with Total Focus is not so much the power itself, it's that the follow-up can be devastating. Nine times out of ten, that will be Energy Transfer, which itself hits extremely hard. If Total Focus crit for the full critical damage amount, there may not even be an enemy to hit with Energy Transfer. Buuuut .. that being said I would be interested to see what that would even look like, if just for one day on a certain beta server....

I really get the sentiment that so much of the set mechanic relies on Total Focus. I feel like my character should have Super Jump as an inherent with the amount of leaping that they do. That being said, I felt that I could completely ignore Energy Focus if I wanted to, and the set would still perform well. I want to point something out here, that aside from the instant Energy Transfer, I, personally, feel that Power Crash is the biggest change, really. Energy Melee really suffered for not having at least two reliable AoEs in large mobs of enemies. I mean, sure, you can basically OHKO Minions & Lieutenants, but if you have one or two mobs of 10+ jumping up and down on you, it's a lot to juggle. Being able to use Whirling Hands & Power Crash to thin the herd down so that I can remove a Boss from the game gives me the breathing room I'd wanted for so long with Energy Melee. But, since this is Feedback, I wouldn't be opposed to say, Barrage & Energy Punch having a chance to trigger Energy Focus. That's why it's on Beta, after all.

Let me put it this way: Energy Transfer -> Total Focus -> Instant Energy Transfer. Thanks to Energy Transfer's recharge being so low, it's more than possible to get two in quick succession, especially with the use of Hasten. The self-damage from Energy Transfer was basically negligible on Radiation Armour.

I went and tried out an Energy Melee/Radiation Armour Brute. Basic IO's only, no sets. It still works really well. Even though it wasn't pulling anything close to four figures, the Total Focus -> Energy Transfer combo is still good enough to drop most bosses into a situation where Bone Smasher can finish them off. Thanks to Power Crash & Whirling Hands, I could also deal with the rest of the mob. Not as much of a slog to get through missions now, I honestly would not want to go back to Stun, ever. Overall I approve of the changes, and I hope they go to Live with only minimal changes.

I think the purpose of this thread was a way for the developers to touch base with the community for what to work on in the future. It was never intended to be "make a suggestion and we'll put it in next patch!" Be patient. Good things come to those who wait.

So, my testing with an Energy Melee/Invuln Scrapper with an expensive build went uh, very well. I was running missions on +1/x4 /w Bosses for a bit before bumping it up. Total Focus -> Energy Transfer is a really strong combo that, even if you went and did something wild like reduce how much damage it dealt, would still be a devastating combo. As it should be, in my opinion. Defeating a +1 Boss in two hits is hilariously funny. The inclusion of Power Crash means that Energy Melee, at least in my experiences, has one of it's major weaknesses (lack of AoE) patched up significantly. Now, this is all based on my very Casual experiences. I'm not a Pylon diver, I don't regularly play at +4/x8 so, my testing is skewed because for me, even doing +1/x4 /w Bosses is good by my standards. I'll test again on a different, budget build and see how it performs with minimal/no slotting. But, to give you an idea of what kind of numbers it can pull out:

I play this game for fun, not to work. Hard pass.

I did some digging and, as it turns out, there was a thread last year asking for, you guessed it, perma-night to be removed. So are we just meant to repeat the cycle? If so I'll gladly nominate myself to make next year's thread.

All that's going to happen is that next year someone will complain that the night-time goes on too long. The "two weeks on, two weeks off" compromise works for everyone. I don't really know what else there is to say, except maybe uh .. deal with it?

Then we would be back to square one. The Devs innocently, naively, perhaps foolishly thought that giving both sides an equal amount of time to enjoy their favourite time of the day during the event would keep everyone happy. Maybe now people will understand why updates take as long as they do when something as innocuous as the time of day can be divisive.

I think you might be forgetting about something that might be keeping people indoors.

Person 1: "Ugh devs can we get rid of the perma-night for Halloween?" Dev: "You betcha, here you go." Person 2: "WTF??? Why did you do that????" #JustDeveloperThings

Even if Bio Armour had been subject to rigorous testing, it would still outshine it's pre-F2P peers. Most of the purchased power sets do. After all, nobody wants to buy a power set that is worse than something that was there at launch.

Enterbasefrompasscode will still be one of the fastest methods of travel, and I understand why it's function was changed. I also found it very convenient but this just be the way things are.

I never said it was impossible, only that without a Defender/Mastermind it very much is impossible.