Riverdusk

Guess that shows how long it has been since I've done an MSR. Never even heard of that particular joke.

SR also has Quickness which helps. Ninjitsu is another one that I find it less an issue as it also has a built in move speed buff power. Actually even a bit better as Ninja's also includes jump speed, not just run speed. I found it kind of fun and thematic to quickly jump after them to them to slap them down as they tried to run away. It'd actually be cool if all the scrapper sets that didn't have a taunt aura had a movement speed buff instead imo.

Energy Aura armor set gives different amounts of energy and negative defenses. Epic set Mace Mastery scorpion shield is another common one for a lot of my characters and it gives smash/lethal/energy defense and yet zero negative defense. Mu Mastery charged armor is my favorite go to when I want resistance instead of defense from an epic set and it gives smash/lethal/energy resistance, no negative resistance. I actually run into splits of types all the time personally, although it is more common from the epic pools.

As mentioned, they actually have an xp penalty compared to other groups, and they were already buffed with super stunners (which certain of my builds find a PITA already), so I'd say no.

Basilisk Gaze is probably the most common low level set I use. A defense bonus and a 7.5% recharge bonus with only 4 slots is pretty good and usually 4 is good enough for a hold power to get the job done. Also much more likely to go ahead and boost rather than attune the sets that cap out at level 30. Getting the set bonus down to level 27 isn't too bad. And, surprisingly, a 30+5 actually beats an attuned level 50.

Could just add this kind of stuff to the "info terminals" that are everywhere if they wanted to do so (that almost no one ever looks at). Don't think we need "ouro billboards" for it.

I know unpopular opinion, but I kind of miss prestige. I always wished they'd just made things super cheap instead of going absolutely free. Cheap enough that a solo SG would still be easy enough to build with a minimal investment. I'm a big fan of a 'sense of progression' and there isn't any anymore for SG building. Cheers to those that just want a creative free playground though and some of the bases out there are amazing.

Back the in day, Howling twilight made me feel like a god much more often than it does now. 3/4ths of the team is dead? Howling Twilight. Now they aren't. Along with most people being more tanky now a days, it also doesn't help that self rezzes are a dime a dozen now. Many times I can't even take the 2 seconds to cast a rez before the person pops back up on their own. Why I never bother taking them unless they have other benefits like howling twilight does. On the other hand, I'm surprised how often I still get to use vengeance on an average PuG. There's usually still at least one person that manages to be not so sturdy or is just leveling up unslotted or whatever.

Keep in mind it is on the weaker side for duration. Per City of Data Entropic Aura has a base duration of 2.25 seconds taunt and tics every 2 seconds. So, keeping purple patch in mind, things will only stick to you the entire time fighting up to +1. If you are fighting +4's they'll only be taunted for about 1 second out of 2 seconds. Bio, Shield, Invuln, and Rad's taunt auras in comparison have a 13.6 second duration with a 1 second activation tic. Only other one that is weak like that is willpower (1.25 second taunt with a 1 second activation tic) Often what I've noticed is it just leads to them doing kind of a dance of being taunted to you and then turning around, running a very short way, then coming right back to you. So, not a huge deal. But I tend to stick a taunt enhance (50+5) into both energy aura and willpowers taunt auras to help cut down on the issue, whereas none of the other ones need it.

I've been curious about this as well. If you missed the arc and do it through Ouro do you get the 2 hour version the first time you do it, or do they rob you and only give you the 5 minute echo version (I think it's only 5 minutes?) even though technically it is your first time? Your situation might be even a bit different as you said since you did technically do the arc once before.

I noticed one time I also failed to get the reward. I made an assumption that it failed to grant because I was level 25 or 26 when I finished. So was outside the level range of the arc and that was probably why it didn't give it to me. Stephanie is level 20-24 per the wiki. Were you at that level or higher when you finished it? Not that it shouldn't still be considered a bug, I think it should be. But that was the reason I assumed why I didn't receive it once. Now I make sure to always complete the entire arc before I hit level 25 and I've never failed to get it. However, I've never tried to repeat the issue to truly confirm.

Running your numbers to get RA down from 8 second base to 2.2 recharge you'd need about +260% recharge total (8/3.6=2.22 seconds). To get TM from 18 seconds down to 3.61 you'd need very close to max recharge the game allows +400%. (18/5=3.6 seconds). That is a 140% recharge difference in Time's favor in your comparison. Even accounting for chrono shift that gives +50% vs AM that gives +30%, the difference shouldn't be more than 20% for a fair comparison. Your numbers again are not an actual fair comparison. I personally wouldn't be against a small buff of some sort, a little extra added to it. But it doesn't help your case when you exaggerate your numbers. If I can do it in a minute, Devs can see right through it even more easily. And as I said before, if radiant aura gets something, then empathy's healing aura, thermal's warmth, and pain's nullify pain should also get a 'little something' as they are all identical powers in all but name.

Speaking of empathy though, Radiant Aura is exactly the same healing and recharge as empathy's healing aura. Also exactly the same power in stats as Thermal's AoE heal and Pain's AoE heal. As mentioned, Time's heal has more than twice the recharge, not comparable. You can actually heal more over time with radiant aura than with temporal mending, although you'd need to spam it. You'd need to buff all of the "standard" AoE heal powers or increase their recharge to offset any increase in their healing.

Just tested on my MM and I didn't see that happening. I always keep "Stealth (PvE)" monitored from combat attributes and it never went to 0 (while running the Stealth power). I even went near a mob close enough to have them see the reef and attack and kill it and they ignored me (as long as I stayed far enough away not to get hit by stray AoE).

Was going to say, had to deal with that on my /sonic characters with disruption field forever now. It is just that almost no one plays sonic so not many people had the pleasure of getting annoyed by it.

Yep. And to be honest I remember a lot of people skipped the old nukes with the long recharge and crash, as well as the only slow and interruptible snipes. Wasn't unusual at all from what I remember.

Or just ask first. Or just watch for a while and see how they react to other people offering advice. There will always be someone, it's human nature, and then you aren't the one being yelled at.

Sounds you are talking mostly about in a Twitch stream or something. Problem is that is very much going to vary depending on the streamer and it is their stream, so their rules, "consensus" doesn't matter. Some don't like ANY directions, others are much more lax. I do agree with you there is a difference between technical gameplay reminders compared to story spoilers or more directly telling them how to play. As said though, some don't want anything at all, no matter how simple.

Strongly in charge of this one, if for nothing else because the gfx have always been a bit broken. Although I think it is specifically for any tohit or defense buff on a character, because I see it happen with inspirations too. You end up with little floating white rectangles inside a character model when you have such buffs and you are also stealthed (translucent). It almost looks like missing textures or something. At least, that's what I always see, and have always found it minorly annoying.

Can't say I've ever tried it, but in my experience phantasm tends to be quite squishy, unless you have a secondary that is really powerful defensively (like /dark). I wouldn't say FFG would cut it so I'd expect him to die when he goes into melee with enflame on. For a lot of secondaries I treat him more as a short term pet and recast him about as often as I do phantom army. Just an assumption though, maybe someone else has actually tried it. Or if you do try, let us know how it works out. 😀

Resistance can just as easily be the way to go imho. That bodyguard mode is resistance allows you to stack it and maximize it. If you are at 75% resistance and in full bodyguard mode (also 75% resistance) you are effectively at 93.75% resistance (only taking 25% of 25%), which is actually higher than a tank can achieve. Main drawback as usual is you are potentially being hit with all the mez and debuffs. Often I will go for a resistance epic and still aim for a moderate amount of defense (25-30% or so) and it seems to serve me well. Usually easy to keep a few medium purples handy when things get rough. It is also usually easier to aim for positional instead of typed that way, which I find more powerful. Anyway, as a marine being able to summon sharks is just too tempting and leviathan's shield is a resistance one. 😁

I think the fact that it does knockdown takes the edge of danger off it a lot. You can jump in with it, knock most things down, and jump right back out before they can even stand back up if you don't want to stay in melee. The bubbles even give you extra jump. I'd say the only one it might mess with is the hover blaster style, which I really don't do. Even then I'd think you could hover back up out of range while they are knocked down? I do find myself doing a lot of jumping around on my thugs/marine MM with the set. Still less than I probably do with my dominators though. Probably the biggest reason is less the danger and more that in order to use the heal you do have to be somewhat at range since it is a cone. Whitecap and soothing aura definitely work somewhat at odds. I think the devs like to encourage players to move around though, always have.

Even its proc chance doesn't seem great (31% with no slotted recharge, if Mids is to be believed). I went ahead and took it anyway though and just threw an accuracy and an achilles heel in it. I figure I can spam it once I have enough global recharge to keep the -resistance proc up fairly well on a decent number of mobs. It also does help me hit things with plasmatic taser which is my guilty pleasure of a START temp power I like to throw around. Definitely skippable though. Probably most disappointing to me is that its slow doesn't even include -recharge, it is only -speed.

Interesting, I always recommend /time as a secondary for new MM players when they ask for a suggestion and I think it works great for any primary. I find it is one of the strongest sets, and definitely one of the easiest sets to play. It's +recharge might not help, but it has solid defense (and -tohit), solid control, and strong AoE healing. Also a ton of -recharge which is a great "defense" of its own for MM pets. You can actually stack distortion fields, which I find a bit crazy. Farsight also has +tohit and benefits from power boost (unlike FFG), so it actually has a bigger potential than FFG by a decent amount. Then there's its movement slows. I think especially for newbie MM's one of the most common times for things to go sideways is when mobs run off and scatter which then causes your henchmen to scatter after them if you aren't quick to control them. All the slows keep things nice and bunched and controlled, both the enemies and the henchmen. Creates one of the smoother mastermind experiences. I know thugs/time was a FOTM around here at one point for how strong it was considered although I think that has faded now since thugs weren't included in the last round of buffs. Edit: And back to the OP, I would recommend a beast/time, would make a great MM for a first timer. I had one and found it very good.

I'd just nit pick on the word "far" behind the other sets. I'd say more like slightly behind. The MM primaries are closer balanced by far than they have ever been now. What I considered "far" behind is what mercs used to be before their buff. I have a beast/cold myself that seems to compete fairly well with any of my other MM's, although can't say I'm one to crunch the numbers or run trapdoor time trials or anything.