Lazarillo

4. Play a set that doesn't require a janky workaround to a problem that didn't need to exist in the first place, just to achieve basic functionality.

I did not enjoy this one as much as the vigilante one. A little too...spread apart. The mission maps, in a literal sense, which just felt unnecessarily huge, but also just kinda the disparate plot points. I'm also kind of a stickler for "continuity", and to me, putting this arc at level 40 despite taking place after the Marchand arc, which in turn takes place after the Incarnate arcs (even if Marchand can be started at 30, it's post-50 in plot terms), made me disappointed that I can't approach it properly in order, either. Also, while I did this on a fresh character, I would hope that if I'd done the various Praetorian arcs that allow you to meet up with Houston, Arvin, Tunnel Rat, etc (or the Primal arc with Alexander the Great), that that gets properly acknowledged. But I didn't have any characters ready for testing that could confirm those, unfortunately. I also feel like Arvin becoming a villain felt a little...contrived. The Center has mutant charisma, not, like, active brainwashing. I feel like there needs to be more on why a Resistance Warden would join him. Also, I apparently got the "hero" ending, which I'm not sure what the key difference is? It seemed to be because I didn't beat up Ravenstorm and the doc, which felt to me less like a moral stand, and more like a "enemy of my enemy" thing. So with all this, I realize there's a lot of complaints, but I will say it was solidly fun, and neat to see how all the various characters interact with each other. Plus, even if, as the player, I didn't get to hang out at the Mermaid Tavern, my character did, something I've wanted (along with more Striga content in general) for a long time. So thanks for sending me back to one of my favorite places.

Yep, so now Storm could be bad 50% of the time instead of only 25%!

Per my previous experience, with about a 30 second recharge, allowing me to drop it on around three of every four mobs, when solo and moving relatively slowly on large groups. Storm Cell following me does nothing because I need it in front of me where the enemies are.

I don't see how this would fix the problem that it's not up every fight. Right now, Storm Blast is basically "fine" when Storm Cell is up and in place, and far too limited when it's not. The set should not have to pay a penalty in downtime to be "fine" the rest of the time. True, Faraday Cage is a very nice power that Electric Affinity is worth taking almost for that, alone, though EA makes due pretty well even without it. ...while Storm Cell is literally the power that all of Storm Blast's performance is built around. The set as a whole needs to be buffed, and needs to have its intensely team-unfriendly repel removed, if it can't rely on its keystone power. Just flat out. If the intent is to make Storm Blast a gimmick set for people to make "proc it and git gud" posts about, then feel free to disregard this, I guess. My opinion doesn't really matter in that case anyway, since I'm just a peon, and I'll avoid it. But if the intent is to make a set that's fun for regular play, and doesn't tick off people on teams who aren't dealing with it too, then it needs to be...properly configured.

Did a quickie run through the arc. Maybe a couple notes: 1. Let me start off by saying the writing felt spot-on. This was a real "City of Heroes" story, and one in which it still felt like I was the "main character". I love it, to the point I'd say it's one of my favorites of HC and even the original run's late-made stories that I've done. Of course, I saved the Rogue one for second because I'm more of a "Rogue" kinda guy, so maybe I'll be right and that'll be even better, but if so, cool beans. 2. On that note, there seem to be a lot of branches, that's cool. It's interesting enough that I can see myself wanting to play it on multiple characters. Earning alignment points as I go was a nice touch too. I accidentally picked the "wrong" ending for the character I was playing on, though it sounds like there's...more to the arc than meets the eye. I'll have to try it again on another character, maybe. I am a little curious, based on comments in this thread, it seems the arc's a little different from Ouroboros (makes sense!), but if so, is the first Ouro run going to look like the "did it at the natural level" arc? Or is it gonna be different from the start? If the latter, I might encourage this to have its level cap raised. I'm pretty sure all the villain groups from it go to 50 anyway. 3. I was playing a character of the Science origin, and after the first mission, there was an origin-based option to talk to the doctor about his research. Not sure if all the origins have this or not. He gave his justification and whatnot, and yeah, seems well-enough-written and whatnot, but I noticed that there was another option a little further down where he basically went through his reasoning a second time (his examples were different, but it sounded very repetitive). I think it's the one about the kind of experiments? Yeah, I mighta been reading a little too fast. Regardless, this could maybe stand be streamlined a little?

Okay, same character (Storm/Electric Sentinel), but this time, I did a set build, to kinda compare it to what my other builds can do, and so here comes my next (final, until/unless there are some changes?) round of feedback. Without Mids, or anything, this wasn't a totally tweaked build, but was fairly high-end-ish, included Alpha slot (Cardiac VR), and I ran solo at +2/x4, Bosses on, which is kind of my "this should be nice, brainless fun at this level of build" gold standard. I put a KB->KD IO in Category 5 because it's kind of unclear which powers do KB and which don't, but that was the only one of those I used, however, I did take Frostbite from the Epic pool and that's got some -KB too (wouldn't work on the Jet Stream repel though, unless there's a special mechanic I'm unaware of, or didn't notice). Anyway, that's the context: Once again, it just really, really, really feels like being able to place my Storm Cell and keep it in place is the key to success or failure. When I can do that, I make pretty short work of the mobs I face. When I don't, things start getting out of hand and are messy to clean up. With the sets and enhancements I used, I got it down to about a 30 second Recharge, which handles things about 3/4 of the time when soloing but isn't likely to cut it on a team. When longer Recharges are factored in due to non-optimal builds, or leveling, or even, maybe honestly just not having an Immobilize holding stuff in the field (I let Frostbite lapse once or twice), stuff scatters and things start going much more poorly. The Storm Cell seems to meander a bit once mobs start taking the "flight" option of their fight-or-flight choices. All that said, once again, my experiences suggest to me that the most important thing this set needs is a SIGNIFICANTLY faster Recharge on Storm Cell. And honestly, coupled with that, it probably should be immobile (the second summoned pet seems already to replace the first...I saw the icons stack at at least one point, but I'm pretty sure the pet itself de-and-re-spawned). I want it where it "belongs", not wherever its AI thinks it saw a shiny thing (again, it's usually not too bad about this, but a couple times, I saw it wander). I feel like Cloudburst could maybe use some love. It does about the same amount of damage as Lightning Strike, but it's a DoT (albeit a reasonably quick one), and has a longer activation time, and time before the hit lands. It is a better damage power than Hailstones, in a set that really only needs 3 out of the 4 single target attacks, and it might be intentional to choose between the two for damage, versus control? If so, I feel like on that note, Hailstones could use a little more oomph, too. Maybe instead of 25/50% to KD depending on Storm Cell, make it flat out 50/100% KD? And in addition to the debuff, maybe 1-2 more ticks for Cloud Burst if used with Storm Cell? A lot of the power descriptions are very unclear. I'm not sure the best way to handle that, but for example, Intensify says it increases "storm strength", and has a +Special, but that's not very descriptive. I assume that means it's buffing Storm Cell to more often tick damage, maybe? Or that it enhances the secondary effects when powers are used in Storm Cell? Or something else? I'd like to know what I'm getting out of it, besides the normal-ish Aim buffs. Similarly, Storm Cell itself. I can slot it for damage or knockback, but the numbers in the power don't reference how much, if any, it's actually doing, or what the chances of it ticking are, etc (also, by default there's a ring around it...I'm guessing, but that means I don't currently have a cell active?). And same with Category Five. It talks about growing in power and synergy with other Storm attacks, but it's really unclear how any of that works, if any of the damage ticks it mentions are connected to that, or the different KB chances, etc. It definitely seems to be laying waste to my foes, but it would be nice to be able to better understand the process by which I'm doing it. So, summing up: give faster Recharge and better placement control for Storm Cell, maybe a small buff to Cloudburst and/or Hailstones, and let me know what my various buttons do besides "make something awesome-looking happen".

Two points of note: 1. The katana change to its current HC-live state was made by HC. It was also carried over to the "no redraw" option on pretty much all other weapons already. 2. By the description in the patch note, at least (perhaps some of us are misreading it? Devs, please feel free to clarify because I think it'd settle a lot of the current discussion!), it actually reverts that, and makes it so that if you're not already attacking, it'll play the weapon draw animation again (basically removing the no redraw option and locking you into drawing on your initial attack).

Having now had a chance to jump on and do just a little bit of preliminary investigation with a Storm/Electric Sentinel, I once again reiterate, now from personal experience that Storm Cell really seems like it needs to be Faraday Cage-y. Even with the follow effect, it seems to do so very slowly and minimally (it would get to the mobs in melee with me and stop), and ironically, that just makes the repel even more problematic since it's more likely than anything to push enemies away/out of it. It's also very hard to see, making it difficult to maneuver with. Both of these things, as well as the problems with the cone attack, as others have noted, and more, just seem so much more straightforward to fix by simply making the core of the set more reliably useful. The one positive point: I do greatly appreciate that it does not generate aggro by default, making it very convenient to set up, so big kudos on that. The set felt a little anemic but I was using only basic IOs, and I usually slot set stuff pretty heavily, so it's probably just that...or it might, again, be kind of an issue with Storm Cell being too unreliable. Gonna retry with my normal slotting habits when I have a bit more time. For now: it's a gorgeous set (others have talked about how awesome the snipe animation looks: I absolutely agree, once of the coolest looking powers in the game), and a badass concept, but wasn't very fun to play.

Just a small note here, since it's honestly less important than the AR and DP discussions, but I will note that I put my Water/Energy Blaster on beta last night and bummed around with it a little, and it was fabulous. I'm a friggin' water machinegun now, thanks for these. Okay, now back to letting people more versed than I figure out if the DP change is worth it or not.

I mean, I agree on that first point. That's why I don't see why it shouldn't be a Faraday Cage sort of thing with a no-stacking recharge, that doesn't move. It can be placed as needed, when needed, and without having to be overly concerned about janky AI movement choices or an unusably-long Recharge power. Rain powers are fine when they're just rain powers. But this is set-critical. Imagine if Super Reflexes changed Practiced Brawler so that its effect was provided by an invisible FFG. You could, but why, when there's a much less janky solution?

Your not supposed to keep up the power the whole set is based around?

That just feels like a whole other issue. If it moves on its own, you don't have control of how/whether enemies end up inside it. Which is fine on a power like Creepers, but I wonder a bit when it's the main gimmick power on a set that revolves around a gimmick.

My general thought just from looking is that Storm Cell's recharge is too long, given the general way the set seems built around it. I feel like a faster recharge, but with summoning a cell replacing an existing one (a la Faraday Cage) would be more appropriate. It would also keep the set's main filler AoE more consistently useful. I'm also somewhat dubious on all the -End, since End drain wasn't good enough for Electrical Blast, why add it here without actually giving it the same benefit Elec Blast gets too?

I just had a wild and crazy idea, an idea for a revised Super Strength for Scrappers: Tier 1 - Punch Tier 2 - Haymaker Jab is generally considered an easy skip due to its extremely low damage. Remove it from the early powers, but it'll be used a little higher up with a new function. The previous t2 and t3 powers can be carried up one each, as they're both not far off from t1/t2 powers in other sets anyway, so no real changes would need to be made. Tier 3 - "Smash" I was trying to think of a decent name, but a lot of the basic stuff's already taken. This would be a melee cone attack with damage comparable to punch, just a little extra, early AoE. For the animation, maybe something like the one for Power Crash or even Bitter Ice Blast (see Vanden's avatar for how cool those could look with SS), or Cross Punch if a snazzy new animation were demanded. Tier 4 - Jab Jab is moved up to a higher tier, keeping its quick animation and low damage, but upping its Recharge, somewhat, and making it a Follow-Up/Blinding Feint workalike, or alternatively a Rib Cracker workalike. This would also override the existence of Rage in the set, replacing the power said to be rather problematic for Scrappers with a weaker equivalent that allows more damage/accuracy by working it into the attack chain. Tier 5 - Hand Clap Particularly with the added cone in t3, no changes need to be made here, I don't think. Tier 6 - Confront It's a Scrapper set, it gets a single target taunt. Let's continue. Tier 7 - KO Blow KO Blow seems to be often said as the other power that's problematic as it would be potentially too damage on a Critical Hit. My thought here is to remove all Critical "damage" from this one and instead make it sort of a gimmick-crit. KO Blow, on a Crit now lives up to its name: it instantly defeats a minion or LT (something that an attack like Greater Fire Sword or Seismic Smash would do with a crit already), as well as a boss below 30% health or an EB below 20%. This would be slightly more powerful, but in exchange, KO Blow crits would have no effect on Archvillains/Heroes/Giant Monsters/etc. Tier 8 - Hurl Tier 9 - Foot Stomp Just like the first two tiers, the final two really need no changes, and could be proliferated to Scrappers as-is, I think.

I mean, people seem just as tired of DC movies these days (then again, I got "fatigued" of Marvel/superhero movies like 10 years ago anyway, so this is mostly an outside-looking-in perspective).

Okay, here's my hack. I find it really improves my game experience. First, I delete all small and medium ones (and/or disable them from dropping at P2W). Then, I group them all up by type in my tray. Groups that are related (such as purples and oranges) tend to be close to each other. There's always a wakie in the bottom right corner, because I'm paranoid that if I alt-tab out of the game for a second and hit f5 to refresh a page (something that's never happened in something like 10 combined years of playing the game), it might accidentally hit in game and ruin this plan. This is what I call a wakie block (mini-hack!). Anyway, once I have my groups, and it looks nice and pretty, and this is the key part: I NEVER USE ANY INSPIRATIONS AGAIN. I mean, I would, but I might need them for something more vital later. I wouldn't want to waste them now! Plus, the pattern in the tray is so pretty...

I'd imagine few things quite ruin a Longbow Agent's day like standing around, minding one's own business, and all of a sudden your buddy bursts into flame.

Cremate has an extremely nice guaranteed knockdown, though, that's not really going to factor into Trapdoor times, but makes a hell of a difference when you're trying to deal with enemies that can pop problematic powers.

Whoops. I probably had three different ways to explain it in my head at once and they ended up intersecting. That's usually how it goes. I corrected the explanation, thanks.

If you want more "flair" from your Darkness, rather than simply "the toughest option that uses all Dark-tagged sets", you might get more mileage out of going with a Dominator, then. The big trick is that your primary defense is going to come in the form of offense. Gotta lock down those legions first (with all sorts of suitably impressive-looking coils of darkness and whatnot), then they can look upon your works and despair.

That's not really what I meant, in and of itself. But in building for extra defense in or not, those debuffs can also send one into negative numbers and make attacks hit more frequently. In my experience (my main /Dark Brute is Energy/Dark, FWIW), that doesn't mean much when I'm seeing defense debuffs augmenting, say, Lethal damage, because Lethal damage pings off my character anyway. But when enemies are doing them with Energy attacks (again, looking at high-level Paragon Police Department, especially, or Clockwork, or groups that use Praetorian weapons such as Resistance, Warworks, and even the occasional high level Family), those cascades mean more hits build up from stuff that does like 5x the relative damage.

So first off, props to /Dark Armor, on Brutes, which is honestly pretty great. It's solidly easy to cap damage resistance on it, particularly using a Cardiac Alpha power that will also solve most of its Endurance woes (but where doing the same on the tank, a lot of it gets wasted because you go up to and above those resistance caps, in some ways, too easily). It does suffer a little bit in the late game against the high amount of energy damage a lot of groups churn out, particularly when you've got them also adding defense debuffs to those energy attacks (PPD, Clockwork, even Praetorians), but on the flip side it's also one of the few sets that can protect itself against every status effect in the game (lookin' at you, Longbow and KoV, with your Terrorizes). So on the whole, best single Dark set, IMO, and I love it. But since this is specifically inquiring to being 100% Darkity Darkdark, does DM also hold as strong? Well, it's still a solid choice, and there's some synergy between the sets. It's not my favorite melee set but is probably good enough when you consider pairing it such a nice armor set. Toss in Soul Mastery's Darkest Night (another big end drain, but again, if using Cardiac, that helps a lot), and you're going to be looking at all around a pretty tanky combo. The question becomes, is "tanky" what you want from your token edgelord character?

This is because the "heroic" ATs only originally got APPs, and the "villainous" ones only got PPPs. Furthermore, the original sets of APPs matched the original options available to their respective ATs. Defenders didn't get Ice Blast until much, much later. So Defenders had an Electric APP from the start because they had Electric Blast from the start, which was later proliferated to Corruptors, and Corruptors had no Ice set because they had patron-themed powers instead, including Mu Mastery, which was later proliferated to Defenders. I'm not saying I wouldn't be for more APP options, but for better or worse, there is a logic to why this specific option isn't available, at least.

I like Illusion/Dark a lot. It's pretty ranged oriented, you stick the phantoms in the fray, then stand black and blast. And one thing to consider with Illusion/Psi is that a lot of Illusion uses Psionic-typed attacks, too, so you end up more likely to run into mobs that can stonewall you. Dark gives you more versatility.