Stormwalker

Ultimately, I'm done arguing on this count for one simple reason: the entire argument comes down to how you define "Super Strength". Since we do not agree on how we define it, it's impossible for us to come to agreement on the subject. I consider someone who is 10-20 times stronger than any human to have Super Strength. That doesn't meet your criteria. As long as we disagree on that point? We'll never agree on whether Scrappers should have it. There's no point in arguing about it further. We're just going in circles.

Quite a few of DC's writers have disregarded that part of the lore, too. Mind you, my preferred Batman IS more of a martial artist, so I don't disagree with you on this count. Though, frankly, he's closer to Street Justice than he is to CoH's Martial Arts set which is almost all kicks. He kinda falls in between them. That said, this is a sidetrack. My actual point was that the CoH devs based Street Justice on their idea of how Batman would fight - which is to say, they intended it to reflect someone who did NOT have superhuman strength, rather than someone who does.

The original CoH devs disagree with you on that count, apparently. Though, I should say, this is another case where writers are not very consistent. Some writers write Batman with a very highly technical combat style. Others write him being more brutal (a la the Arkham games). Street Justice is more akin to the latter.

This is back to the semantic argument. You're defining Super Strength in a way that restricts its scope in ways the game doesn't. Again, we're not likely to agree on this count. Semantic arguments, in the end, tend to go around in circles.

The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe says "10 tons minimum".

The way Spidey has been written by some writers at least, Foot Stomp is within his capabilities (only just, but still within it). Also, the Marvel strength ranking on their website doesn't list Peter at 10 tons. It lists him at "10 tons minimum". Whereas most of the other characters get a set value. This is basically Marvel admitting that some of their writers have written him quite a bit stronger than that. Bear in mind, most of my comics collection is pretty old-school. It hails from the '90's, mostly. So my interpretation of characters tends to hail from that age. Marvel was a pretty free-wheeling with the power levels back then, though not quite as much as DC has been at times.) Also, you mentioned Luke Cage? His durability is only a 5 on the Marvel scale. That's "Bulletproof" - it's the same category as Reed Richards and Emma Frost. Pretty much in the Scrapper durability range.

I actually like this idea, though I know a lot of players would hate it. Tuning it in such a way that a skilled player could make it genuinely useful in a team would be quite a challenge, but if that was accomplished it would be a lot of fun. It would require a certain amount of bravery to play, though, since there are a lot of players who just wouldn't team with you even if it was well-tuned. That said, I would suggest adding at least ONE non-Knock control to the set just because you don't want to be completely one-dimensional (because if you run into an enemy with extremely high KB protection, you'd end up useless). Possibly "Capture" as a Hold? Actually, make that "Check".

As I said, Marvel has not been very consistent about how they depict his strength. This is not uncommon in comic books, as characters get re-interpreted every time a new writer picks up the character. Some writers put him well into the Super Strength realm. Now, I will give you that there is ONE power in SS that is probably beyond Peter, and that's Hand Clap. But that just means he didn't take that power (many SS characters don't).

As I have noted in my other post, Street Justice is not super strength. It was inspired by Batman. I have a Street Justice scrapper. Her only superpowers are speed, enhanced toughness, and regeneration. Her strength isn't amplified at all. The set suits her very well. It doesn't do for someone with raw physical strength that exceeds human capacities by a large margin (an order of magnitude or more). SS is the only set we have for that. And as I've said before, I want it for scrappers, because I have concepts that are better suited to an SS scrapper than a Brute or Tanker.

If you don't think being able to lift 10 tons is "Super Strength", I don't know what to tell you. That's only... 20 times the highest deadlift ever recorded by a human (which is just over half a ton at 1104 pounds, by Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson in 2020). Also, Peter has been stronger than that at times, they're not very consistent about just how strong he is (as with most comic-book characters). Frankly, CoH characters don't hit hard enough for the kind of Super Strength that Superman and the Hulk have in any case. Peter is far stronger than needed to deal out the kind of damage an SS scrapper would deal in game. He'd have to hold back a lot (as he does in the comics, consistently). In fact, if I go outside of comic books and into the realm of anime, *every single one* of the Knight Sabers from Bubblegum Crisis has super strength from their hardsuits (yes, even Nene, though she doesn't really use it), and Linna Yamazaki is definitely a Scrapper. Priss is pretty much a Scrapper with a snipe (because she has a railgun, but she usually prefers to get up close and personal, and in fact her right gauntlet has a fold-out brace specifically to enable her to punch things with it without risking injuring her hand). In fact, their hardsuits were the very inspiration for my SS/Inv Tanker in-game (and a Scrapper would represent her concept much more accurately). Oh, yeah, and they've taken hits hard enough to leave craters on impact, so they're tough enough to take the big hits, too (but unlike someone like Superman, they do take damage from those hits, so they aren't Tankers). Priss is pretty definitively a Super Strength/Invulnerability scrapper with an Equipped Weapons epic pool to give her the Railgun snipe and Knuckle Bomber explosive attack. Linna is a Super Strength/Super Reflexes scrapper (her suit is less armored and more agile than Priss') with an Equipped Weapons epic pool to give her the Ribbon Cutters and Knuckle Bomber. She's definitely invested in Tough, however. Sylia has superhuman strength in her suit as well, but she prefers to attack with her fold-out swords, so she's effectively Claws as a primary instead, and she gets Laser Cannon from her epic pool. She also, of course, gets the Leadership pool. Nene is an Electronic Warfare/Laser Blast Defender who has only taken two attacks from her secondary and *has* strength amplification in her suit, but never uses it. They all have (thruster-assisted) Super Jump as their travel power. Sylia may also have Hover. And before you try to say that power suits don't count? Technology is an origin, and parts to make power suits absolutely exist in game. So, basically, it seems to me that the reason you don't think Scrappers can have Super Strength is you equate "Super Strength" with a VASTLY higher degree of strength than is necessary to produce the effects of "Super Strength" in game. That's a semantic argument over the definition of "Super Strength", and not one we're likely to come to an agreement on. I'm just going to point at what Super Strength actually does in game, and point out that there are plenty of Scrappers capable of meeting that requirement. Also, I'm just going to point out that Street Justice does NOT cover superhuman strength. It was specifically, according to the dev Q&A on these very forums, inspired by Batman, who does not have any kind of superhuman strength.

SR isn't vulnerable to Cascade Defense Failure. It has 95% def debuff resist. If it can stay above the soft-cap (and there are plenty of ways for it to do so), there is no issue. EA and SD aren't completely immune to Cascade Defense Faiulre, but it's not that hard to avoid on those sets if you are on your game. Regen is a poor example, because it's inherently fragile. I've made many previous posts in-depth on this subject before, so I'm not going to rehash it. This is why Regenners take things like Rune of Protection and Shadow Meld. That said, Regen still has the single best answer to a Rage crash in MoG, because MoG lasts longer than the crash does, and far more than offsets it. Speaking of Shadow Meld, that solves the Rage crash by itself if you take it. Resistance caps only really come into play if you are below the defense softcap. If you have an answer to staying above the softcap during the Rage crash, the resist caps won't matter. There are plenty of solutions for this problem available. You just have to account for it in your build or carry lots of purples. You don't have to double-stack Rage. That's a choice. You can just wait until after the crash to fire it off again. And, as I said before, if you're convinced Rage is that much of a problem for scrappers, then replace it with Build Up and buff the rest of the set so it isn't underpowered. Problem solved.

Spider-Man held up a skyscraper. By himself. He is unquestionably Super-Strength. In fact, he's on the HIGH end of the super-strength scale, not the low end. And he's absolutely a scrapper. Again, the Metropolis Kid was NOT Kryptonian at that point in DC continuity. He had tactile telekinesis in place of the usual invulnerability that the Kryptonians had (when they retconned him later he got proper invulnerability, and he was Kryptonian tough then, but very much not in his early days). He was not durable on the same scale as the Kryptonians. That was my entire point. He was very much a more aggressive/less defensive fighter than the other "Super" characters, and he got the heck beaten out of him on more than a few occasions in his early days. He was definitely a scrapper. He also had the iconic scrapper temperament. A number of people who were not as tough as Juggernaut went toe-to-toe with him for a while. There is some variability between writers as to how tough characters are, this has always been a thing in comics. People are as strong/tough as the plot demands. You list Captain America and Wolverine as your scrapper examples, but neither one of them were invulnerable, and we have invulnerability as a scrapper set. Therefore, scrapper durability clearly does go beyond your examples.

Considering you'd have to nerf Rage to give it to Scrappers (or at least, that seems to be what most people think), you'd have to nerf the crash, too. That said, a Regenner would just pop MoG and be fine. A Willpower scrapper would just pop Strength of Will and be fine. An SR Scrapper could pop Elude and be fine (if they even take Elude, that is; most of my SR scrappers don't), the defense gain would more than offset the defense loss. Similarly, Energy Aura and Overload. Of course, that is just postponing the crash, but it should postpone it long enough to end the fight which is all that matters. Dark Armor's Cloak of Fear would help offset it. Not to mention the to-hit debuff Dark Armor provides. It'd hurt for an Invlun scrapper (I don't suggest Unstoppable here because Unstoppable's crash is way too annoying), for sure, but we have inspirations for that. And if we consider Incarnate powers, Barrier covers a multitude of sins.

The Metropolis Kid version of Superboy, before they retconned him into being part-Kryptonian, was a Super Strength scrapper. He was quite a bit less invulnerable than Superman or Supergirl. Spider-Man is Super Strength, and he's not that much tougher than a normal human. He's just good at avoiding hits or rolling with them using his spectacular agility. The '90's X-Men version of Rogue was pretty much a Super Strength scrapper. She got knocked around quite a bit more than the other "invulnerable" X-Men like Colossus. That's three off the top of my head.

I'm honestly not a fan of Rage because it is OOC for a lot of Super Strength comic book characters. Spider-Man doesn't rage. Superman doesn't rage. Hulk, of course, does. But it's not an intrinsic characteristic of having Super Strength. My SS Tanker wears a powersuit. "Rage" doesn't change her strength at all. I justify it in-character by "The booster module, in order to be protected from battle damage, is more insulated than I would like so it overheats after a while and has to shut down briefly to cool off." In other words, I have to invent a "design flaw" in her suit to justify the mechanic.

So many people keep citing Rage as a reason that Scrappers can't have Super Strength. That's not a reason Scrappers can't have Super Strength. It might be a reason Scrappers can't have Super Strength as it is currently implemented for Brutes and Tankers, but it's not a reason we can't have the set. The Scrapper version of the set would just have to be different. See: Energy Melee. Total Focus crits too large for Scrappers to have? OK, that's fine, they changed the way TF works for Scrappers. Guess what? Energy Melee is still my second-favorite Scrapper primary after Claws. Does it bother me that our version is different? No, actually, I like the Scrapper version of it better than the Brute/Tanker version, even, because it feels faster due to the extra Short ET's. If Rage in its current form is broken for Scrappers (and let's be honest, Rage in its current form is broken for everyone. My SS Tanker hits harder than some of my Scrappers did at her level!) then change it for Scrappers. Heck, replace it with Build Up and buff the attacks a bit so that it isn't weak (because SS without Rage would be very underpowered). I'd play it in a heartbeat. I just want a Super Strength scrapper. I don't care if the set is exactly the same as it is for Brutes and Tankers or not. As long as the performance is reasonable, I'm there. After all, I still play my Kin Melee/WP and Psi Melee/WP scrappers which are pretty much the textbook definition of mediocre performance, so I'm obviously not allergic to non-optimal builds. I just want a Super Strength Scrapper. That's all.

Ack! Traumatic flashbacks! I hate that story arc so much. I remember running it back in the early days of Live with my Energy Blaster (which wasn't the first time I'd run it, but it was my first time running it on a character who didn't have mez protection and defenses), and the experience was so miserable that I have never run it again since then. I even have one character who has that story arc available on a contact, and she's level 40 now and that contact is still sitting there with the story arc icon because I refuse to go run it (though obviously I could go run it now at level 40 and it would be hilariously easy). At any rate, I agree with you wholeheartedly here. There's a reason the penalty for being defeated got greatly reduced - because it just wasn't fun.

I wrote up a response to this on my phone a bit ago, and for some reason... it didn't post. So, now I'm typing it up on keyboard, but I'm going to be less long-winded this time. I'm opposed to this idea for two reasons: 1. I like to solo TF's. In the last two days, in fact, I've soloed three TF's on a Blaster. Now... I didn't know when I started those TF's whether I'd be able to actually complete them or not. Because I didn't know if I'd be able to solo the AV's on a Blaster. As it turns out, I was able to do so, but I went in fully expecting to find out I couldn't beat the AV and have to abandon the TF. Obviously, if there was a "shame badge" for abandoning TF's, I wouldn't have taken that chance, and wouldn't have discovered that, guess what, I could do it after all! 2. Ouroboros arcs and SSA's count as Task Forces. People abandon those all the time, for various reasons (badge hunting comes to mind. I abandoned an SSA mission several times the other day while working on getting my Unveiler badge for the FPRM accolade.

So, I soloed Posi 2 on a Blaster (Energy/Energy). Observations on Dr. V (who is the only part of this TF that is remotely difficult to solo): Hover and a reasonably high ranged defense (mine, when auto-exemplared to level 16, was about 28%) trivializes the defensive aspect of this fight. He won't hit you much, and the Embalmed won't reach you at all. Even if you don't have that much ranged defense in your build, you can probably get there with inspirations. On the flip side, I'd rather bring the defense and use damage inspirations. My build was not remotely optimized for level 16. My attack chain was Sniper Blast -> Power Burst -> Power Bolt -> Energy Torrent (because without Energy Torrent there was a gap). It doesn't take a great attack rotation to do the job, if... ...you have Envenomed Daggers. Would have been very hard to finish him off with that attack chain without them. If I had enough recharge to run those three attacks without a gap, it might have been enough, but Energy Torrent is not good DPS, so I definitely needed the daggers. That said, I brought 300 charges and only needed 6. I used four medium damage insps during the fight. Could have done it without those, they just sped it up and meant I used fewer charges on my Envenomed Daggers. I brought a Backup Radio just in case, but it turned out I didn't need it. All told, TF took 39 minutes. Flight cut that down by a whole lot because I could skip most of the outdoor portion of the last mission. Just flew straight to the bombs.

Now I'm tempted to borrow from another game and create the "Elite Yeet Agent". EDIT: Yeah, I did it.

I've already mentioned Kill O'Watts, I think. But I also have another take on the same pun with a Sonic Sentinel named "Killa Hertz".

I hadn't decided on a name yet, but I'll have to consider that one. The idea was inspired by someone else mentioning "Captain Knockback" in a forum post way back when, but I didn't want to directly reference the game mechanic. And until I came up with the battle cry, I wasn't quite motivated enough to do it. I'm also trying to decide, with that battle cry, if the name needs to reference Zero Wing somehow.

Makes sense. If nothing else, having more than one arc to run for it is also good for variety's sake. I'd never actually run the SSA before, so it was interesting to see it. Now I am thinking that before I actually run it to finish it, I should go back and run the previous parts for context, though.

I think the main thing about Nemesis Rex is that you (seem to, at least; I haven't rigorously tested this) get a similar number of Fakes in fewer spawns/smaller map. The snipers are a valid point, though. I also seem to recall getting more than 28 per run, but my memory may be faulty (I have ADHD; my memory is often faulty). Also, I don't think I got that many in my first SSA mission, but I only ran it once and I don't know how much variability there is in the spawns in that mission, so I may have just been unlucky. I didn't full-clear the mission, but I did scout the area by air to make sure I got all the Fakes. There were still tons of Warhulks walking around at the end, though.

This just reminds me that I wanted to make a character with as much KB as possible (for solo play, of course; I wouldn't inflict this idea on a team. I mean, I'm pro-knockback, but the build I have planned for this particular character will not be team-friendly!), whose battle cry was "For great justice, take off to the Zig!". And then I was deeply disappointed to discover that doesn't fit in the battle cry space. I may still create that concept and find a way to put that in a macro or something.