Lazarillo

There's also a rule, to my knowledge, that basically says "no creating real/historically noteworthy figures", though like all the "no [x]-type characters" rules, enforcement is pretty spotty in execution. So making a direct "tribute" to Ozzy would likely be an enforceable conduct violation. Just because of the ways the rules are presented, I'd imagine explicit parodies (the "Spazzy Spazbourne" example above would also be as likely to get acted on as other such examples. But more indirect references through lyrics or song titles are probably going to fly unless you just happen to get spotted by a GM who really hates heavy metal, or something.

I appreciate the responses. Just a couple other bits for clarification. Do you happen to know if there's a way to make the bind I mentioned turn me towards the target but not make my character move? I tried the one I posted and it didn't work, changed it to "Backward 1" and that makes my character auto-run backwards until I hit another direction, which is still kinda not quite what I wanna do. I managed to work it into the build, with about a 75% uptime. We'll see how it goes, thanks. These are about what I was thinking. I ended up going with the LotG and Reactive Defenses bonuses, some pieces of the Numina's set to get it close to the ED cap on the absorb. Alpha-wise, I'm currently leaning now towards Agility, for the EndMod bonuses Auroxis mentoined plus more recharge for better PotD uptime and stacking Brine.

Yes, and then never use them so that my beautiful pattern remains in tact. Actually, though, there's a practical reason for it, too, in that by sticking an Awakening in the f5 slot, if I alt-tab to a web-browser and refresh the page there, a slip in timing doesn't end up popping an inspiration by accident.

I've been feeling both a strong urge to give /Marine a try, and to make yet another new Mastermind, so two points put together, and figuring out which primary I want, and I'm leaning towards Thugs with it. It feels like it could have some interesting synergies, and so if anyone's got an general comments on how they work together, consider that question 0, I guess. But more specifically I'm wondering a few things: Soothing Wave works the same as Nature Affinity's heal, correct? Just sort of a general cone in the direction I'm facing? So for situations where I wanted the power directed towards a certain target, I'm told working it into a macro/bind with /follow would work. I seem to remember binds execute in "reverse" order but also that they carry steps out simultaneously, so I'm not sure if this would work, but if I wanted to ensure my character turned towards the target and used the power, but didn't start running towards them I'm wondering if this would work: /bind b "backward$$powexec_name Soothing Wave$$follow". Anyone tried to do something like this and can speak to its effectiveness (or not)? How big is the Shifting Tides? I figure my own character is likely to play pretty close to enemies thanks to Whitecap, and obviously the Bruiser will be in close, so we're both getting the benefits regardless. I'm not sure if the otherwise-ranged t1 and t2 henchmen should also be brought into it when possible, given the risk of getting hit by enemy AoEs, but it might be possible to keep them closer to the edge? Or it might not matter at all? Power of the Depths: Is it worth it? Because it looks cool, admittedly, but also looks like kind of a dud power, with even the half of it that lasts the full duration having kind of lousy relative uptime compared with the power's Recharge, and Marine seems to be a pretty "hungry" set in terms of both "needed" powers and in terms of slotting. So this feels like a possibility to free up some room, but maybe there's something about it I'm missing. If there is something I'm missing, is there anything else that's skippable? What's more worth focusing on when slotting Barrier Reef: absorb or defense? Or should I try to split it 50/50 (or some other similar way)? Finally, any recommendations on an Alpha slot, when I get that far? Vigor's one I like for MMs just because it shores up a lot of issues henchmen seem to have, and being able to heal a little harder is also nice (also, do Healing enhancements influence the -HP in Brine? Mids shows it taking them but it's wrong on these sorts of things sometimes). I could also see an argument being made for Cardiac, Nerve, or Agility, or maybe even Spiritual or mayyybe even Resilient (and then there's the common fave of Musculature, though in this case it seems like there are so many other, potentially even more valid options that can help build into the buffs). What do other people like to use?

Director 11 has an actual "power" that makes him run around like a chicken with his head cut off that will supersede taunting. I wouldn't be surprised if Battle Maiden has something similar that makes her "want" to stay inside her damage zones. Both of these AVs being non-responsible to taunts is probably "working as intended", for better or worse.

This, to me feels like the most in-tune with also boosting its (already more than sufficient given its small AoE) target cap. That or, yeah, maybe more damage against the primary target, though that feels a little banal. Either one would make it not feel like I have to hold it back during EF lest I "waste" it. I'll anti-vote the chance to KD, if only because I almost always slot it with a proc for that anyway, and I'd have to change that so I didn't knock stuff back...

I've got no particular beef with it, though I don't log in multiple simultaneous characters particularly frequently. It'd be nice if the launcher better reflected what the current in-game status was. Excelsior's showing up as two dots right now, then you log into the game and it's at three.

You could have just not allowed it on the Discord altogether. I'm in quite a few servers where that's their stance towards art posts. In light of that, allowing it at all does indeed come off as implicit support.

I have a fair number of characters I don't play as much because they're more team-oriented, and when I jump into the game to just play a 50, I rarely have a plan, and, relatedly, don't have much interest in starting and/or finding a team. But even once I'm on and I see something forming, it's "too late" and I'm already playing whatever else was more solo friendly, even if/when I end up joining what I see. Mostly these are (non-Mastermind) support ATs and other squishies. Most notably, I have an Ice/Martial Dominator who I made as sort of P&P game tribute to CoH during the dark years, and was one of the first characters I made in the game when it went public again. But Dominators can feel like such a slog to play outside of specific setups that she never gets the attention I'd like to give her.

The focus should probably be a matter of making it work at all (or honorably admitting defeat and rolling it back), especially since Dimensional Warder progress is effectively missing from the game right now, before they start looking into how to add more bells and whistles to something doesn't even serve its base functionality.

Hmmm, on that note, feels like maybe there should be a "foot entrance" to KW from IP. There isn't, though, AFAIK, or am I wrong?

In fairness, one of the most notable "Hexing" superheroes out in the comics world is of the Mutant origin (when they don't randomly retcon that from time to time, at least, I guess). That said, perhaps "Entropics" would work. It's a neat set, regardless, though I think a lot of the OP's idea of using "stacks" from powers to produce effects should just, like, be power effects, instead, should such a thing be produced.

It is, as someone pointed out to me, basically the same base duration as the other mid-tier hard controls from other sets. Stuff like Stalagmites, Confounding Chant, Synaptic Overload, or Heart of Darkness, all last about as long as Seeds does now. Honestly, this seems relatively like parity, to me. And its Recharge, even when at the max that the Adaptive Recharge gives it, is still slightly less than many of those comparable powers. It's honestly a pretty fair change, better than a lot of the alternative, and rather than what the far-more-gutted versions of the power looked like, this pretty much puts it in parity, which is what sets should generally kinda strive for.

Any server is this, if you choose to play it this way.

This was originally going to be a complaint specifically about Psi Armor, but I went to confirm that it was the only set that didn't have No FX for Hide and it turns out it's not quite. Bio Armor, Electric Armor, Energy Aura, Fiery Aura, Psionic Armor and Radiation Armor all lack a no/minimal FX option. For none of these sets is there anything actually thematic in the power appearance. All of them use the default squiggly lines that look like a mess, particularly over a character that's already invisible. So it's clearly not the case that these are meaningfully tied to the powersets themselves in any way. Every set should be able to eschew the squiggles. Give the same minimal/no FX option that every other Stalker gets, that turns the character transparent while hidden without using the same VFX that's default to the other sets, but which the other sets can opt out of.

Yeah, that's kinda what it seemed but it was also looking, or maybe I'm just hoping, that with other changes this Page, and the existing of Hypnotizing Lights, it might be less of a loss. But thanks, I do appreciate the insight.

I mostly ignored the set in Beta, but looking again, this Pyro/Time combo seems pretty keen. Question as far as skipping powers goes...particularly with the "Deep Sleep" addition, how badly is it of a self-handicap to take Hypnotizing Lights but skip Brilliant Barrage? I suspect this is would be considered kind of a bad idea but the latter power just seems kinda janky to use, and I worry that it'd be too easy to "waste" by applying both statuses to multiple targets, or something.

Sounds like you should just skip the middle man and wreck both groups yourself. HC's track record with original arcs, honestly, has pretty much turned me off to making further attempts. The very first two (I think it was the first, the level 25 Rogue and Vigilante arcs) were good and all the rest have been overcomplicated, letdowns, or overcomplicated letdowns. And the kinda feeble reassurance on this one doesn't really make it sound better.

I mean, look at Magneto and the Joker and we've seen what villains do to nazis, but devs seemed to think being the 5th Column's obedient toady was acceptable for redsiders of any and all stripes, so having people in the blueside spectrum thinking that working with them is okay is just the next step in the "no, guys, you should really think these guys are cool" approach that the writers seem to want to be taking lately.

I rolled my new /Regen Stalker with Energy/, just 'cause it felt like the best combination conceptually, and there's no animation jank with AS (if not for that latter problem, I could see Spines working rather well conceptually, too).

Does it? Or should that not be counted as an inherent leg up that all Tankers get that not all Scrappers have access to?

That honestly sounds about right based on them to me, just with the caveat that having played winged characters and thus noted how low the theshold is for what the game engine considers to be repeatedly hopping up and down really is. In practice, the changes to Grounded's KB protection are not going to be meaningful from Live. This isn't inherently a bad thing. IMO, Electric Armor was already in a pretty decent spot and now it's getting buffed? I ain't complaining. But I'm also not gonna change my habit of sticking a -KB IO on my Elec Armor characters as the only really meaningful way to handle "drive by" KB when they're in transit. (One generally being enough, cause the big stuff mostly only comes when I'm toe to toe with something and not moving anyway. But if you're really curious, I guess, maybe actually try testing the effect on a winged character, specifically, so you can bear in mind that when wings are moving Grounded protection is probably not kicking on.

The skippable power got changed to another power that's still gettin' skipped. But really no "Minimal FX" options, even for Hide, still?

While we're on the subject of this, anything that can maybe be done for that one building that's been burning ever since I did the intro to Mercy Isle arc back in 2019?

I get that's the argument. The counterpoint is "not everything has to be an offensive boost for overall parity to exist". Ninjutsu is much the same. It's pretty disingenuous to call it a lesser version of /SR for Stalkers just because it doesn't have the extra damage Scrappers and Sentinels get, when Ninjutsu also gets a frackton of active mitigation tools that can combine with things like set bonuses and the like to do what /SR can and more, in a lot of cases, as a defensive set. Stalker Hide gets things that Scrapper Mask Presence does not. The idea that inherently must also give an additional offensive buff, specifically, in that or some other power is missing the point that the sets remain equitable for their respective ATs.