Ukase

I hadn't noticed. I find that if I knew what they were last week, determining this week's is simple. Feel free to copy it into your own spreadsheet and expand the dates and share with the rest of us.

I have a project I'm just starting - Beam/Marine Corruptor. I really should make it a defender, maybe after the corr. I'm going a bit crazy trying to plot out a build for a powerset I only have a tiny bit of experience with. So much of the secondary, like a lot of buffs are for teammates, which I only encounter every so often because of my often afk-status. It sits at level 1, with nothing done other than just creating it while I try to figure out the build. I figured it should be quite good, but I'm not sure if I'll get the most out of it when solo. Maybe I'll just play it in the evenings. It's really too soon to say what I think about the set, as I'm not even sure what I'm going to slot in it. I do think the Marine Affinity set would be great for a super team to pursue. I think things will melt even quicker than the fire/rad super teams back on retail. (Not backed by any evidence at all)

Yeah, that proves a little smarter than my suggestion, as it doesn't punish poor performance, it just rewards certain behaviors.

I'm not smart enough to be scared! lol

Absolutely. I was just mindlessly going through the notions and felt like there should have been some punitive action for being careless. I completely get how I should have done it. And I also grasp how annoying some of us get with the actions rescued allies and hostages are capable of. There's the midnighter arc where some lady with a gun - Lady Jane, I think, gets a rescue. I always just zip past her, clear the path and rescue her last, because she's a bit like Fusionette and aggro happy - without the hitpoints to protect herself. Doc Deliah is like that, too - only slightly more sturdy. The game has a good 10-20 missions with characters like this, if not more. Usually, they just get defeated, and "medi-port" away, and nothing changes. I just think in a future arc - it could be kind of like a mad libs thing - where if X happens - you do missions 1,2 & 5. And if Y happens, you have to do missions 1,2, 3, 4, and 5. Or something like that. Just talking out loud. Certainly not a big deal.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/15qwbS67DmKU6A7eaIVb2ghU10CpsFBsLjDd7PHo8dVs/edit?gid=0#gid=0 @Ura Hero Shared this link with us quite some time ago. Still works.

More than a couple of times, there have been missions where I've been tasked with rescuing someone, only to see them fall victim to the npcs. Usually not during escort missions, but where they choose to help me. My characters sometimes are in pursuit of xp, and sometimes in pursuit of merits. When in pursuit of XP, often the difficulty is set fairly high. Today, Lady Gray fell victim to an exploding warhulk. I wasn't aware she was even taking damage because there's no way to monitor her hitpoints, unless I keep her targeted - which is hard to do when trying to target npcs. The mission failed, (although the warhulk was the last to go, lol) and Serpent Drummer let his dissatisfaction be known. Fine. But the idea that he's going to proceed with the story arc as if nothing has changed doesn't sit right. He should just say, "You screwed up. I can't trust you, so go kick rocks". Or some kind of consequence. So, I'm not suggesting we change anything in game now, but for future content, if a situation arises where the player is supposed to rescue someone and that someone gets clobbered, there should be some sort of consequence behind it. It doesn't have to be anything special; maybe just turn us all into a dull gull (as opposed to Null the Gull). It can be silly, or it could be just shutting the arc down.

I hate math.

The only thing I can think of that might do it would be the Avalanche Recharge/Chance for Knockdown that is mucking with the math somehow. Yeah, I unslotted it - and no more KB. Very odd. Just to be sure, I put the Recharge/Chance for Knockdown back in - and they fly again. (the minions, not the lieuts)

So far, I'm having a better understanding of ice armor, that's for sure - even if Dual blades is leaving me a bit of fuzzy thinking. There is one thing that is really bugging me - and that is Typhoon's Edge when it's the finishing move of the Sweep combo. (I'm level 42 and I still have to use the wiki to figure out what the names of these powers and combos are if I'm not logged in) When I use Typhoon's Edge as the finisher to the Weaken combo, it works great. But when I use it on the Sweep, it send them flying. So, now I have to waste a slot on an IO that doesn't directly do anything, but negates them flying away. (already have the overwhelming force IO in 1000 cuts) Or, just don't use the combo. For my money - that alone makes the set in need of refinement. I understand a need for a blaster or another lower HP character to make use of KB. It doesn't make sense for a tank to do so - at least, not to me. And I'm even okay with certain NPCs being susceptible to KB, but it seems to happen no matter what mobs I'm fighting. So, I will be playing ice armor again - as I'm learning more about it, I'm seeing the value in it. (I suppose if hoarfrost had a faster recharge, ice armor would be too OP) I do think Shield is much, much better than Ice Armor, as are Bio and Radiation and invuln, but I do see value in it now, whereas before I didn't. The best part of Dual blades are the sound effects. Particularly 1000 cuts. I could listen to that in a loop.

So, for the record, I did test this one on Brainstorm and was pretty clear that I thought it was a stinker. Some of my concerns were addressed, though - so there's that. I am hopeful that there will be a part 2 or 3 to this arc. Why? Because of one of my problems with the ending. First, though, in order - like what was the point of clobbering 10 trolls in boomtown when you're level 40? Granted, there are no level 40 trolls running around in any zone, but this just seemed like a waste of time to me. They could have easily had the contact say they found out whatever clue we were supposed to get doing that. It was pointless and needless. My second issue was with the ending. I go in there, all expecting to have to clobber everyone in the room except Ash -- and that's the ending we get? It was a bit of a let down. As it stands now, I did that arc for the badge, and it's doubtful I'll ever repeat it. Zone-hopping, a needless hunt, poor story ending. A third thing was how these clones of hero corp heroes were just Paragon Protectors with the same costumes, just different colors. They looked cool in different colors, but the sure weren't clones of Hero Corp - they were more Paragon Protector Clones! The one cool thing about was the looks/costumes of certain npcs who weren't part of the story, and the skin they put on the map where we get to see videos of Countess Crey. Oh yeah, that reminds me of a fourth issue. We go all through that map to click on terminal after terminal - they couldn't have just had us use the same terminal? Or 3 different terminals right next to each other for some type of Redundant Array of Independent Disks? (clearly something Hero Corp should have been using.) So, for me - the story, the implementation - for the most part was a stinker. A few creative bright spots, for sure. But overall, it was a mess. The cool stuff again: The new skin on the old maps Some of the creative names - like "Glory Hound" - loved that, and am kind of pissed I never even thought to try and get that name myself. Some of the costumes were very cool, too.

It's a bit of a difficult question to answer. For kicks and grins, I'll try. Useful when there's a collection of npcs in one concentrated area. I do see a water world where I might use combat teleport and whitecap together, if I think I'm too fragile to withstand the aftermath. The thing to remember is the kd. One thing about npcs (and players alike) - when you're getting back up from being knocked down, you're not attacking. So, it's completely safe to use this power - except against those npcs that don't kd easily. I wouldn't use it against EBs or AVs, but the rest don't hit that hard, so who cares? Granted, at level 6, a +3 boss would probably have a tough alpha. Just depends. This is why I recommend leveling up as opposed to a quick PL - to figure these things out. So, I would suggest we consider it a good idea when things are casual, when you're just grinding out a mission. I wouldn't suggest using it during a Master run, unless you know you'll be okay. So, pretty much, it's a good idea at least 85% of the time. But that's just my opinion.

Hit 35 on this out of my comfort zone ice tanker. After I made sure to become a member of vanguard, I recall a pop-up of Daedalus saying he needs my aid in Cimerora. So, why not - I use the lfg to Cim, and go to him to see how my tank will fare. And he's got nothing for me. So why the pop up? What was the point of that? So, no big deal for me. But there are newer players who are going to leave this meeting with more questions than when they arrived in Cimerora. So, just a suggestion to either disable pop-up contacts, or allow them to actually provide missions. Edit: I clicked on him again, just to be sure - he said to come back at level 40. So...maybe delay the pop-up until level 40.

So, I can comfortably blame Troo and his internet dice for coming up with an ice/dual blades tank for me to play next. I played a couple of dual blades when HC first opened. I remember really liking 1000 cuts, but not much else. Is my memory correct in that these combos are fairly worthless? Sometimes, the attack the combo system would have me use isn't recharged. I think this is why I haven't returned to dual swords. I also have a memory of thinking the attack chains the combos would have me use aren't very likely to give me the most dps..but it's been since 2020, I think, since I played one. Can someone refresh my feeble memory?

I just figured there were one too many tidal pools in the DFB. MMs, most likely. Never trust any AT that has their own minions.

I can't believe I'm going to ask this, but did you take a look at them when they were on brainstorm - you know, before it was published to the rest of the servers? I thought some of them looked pretty decent, although I'm no authority on what looks good. Most of the costume contest winners I see look just ...plain or even bad. But then I just every costume through the silver age lens. I know - getting on brainstorm to check things out seems like a waste of time for some folks. But letting the folks with the power know before it hits is better than letting them know after.

I would have a rough time even identifying which would be hero and which would be villain. Now, the winning character would be the main Ukase, ice/ice blaster simply due to more play time with that character than the others. (combining retail time with HC time)

Who doesn't? I know Snarky could use some. I could use some, but would feel dirty asking. Besides, I have my own I could use. But it would be a lot more fun to use yours.

I think it's a matter of each/all of us wanting things we'd find useful. I love the 10% recharge from the very rare sets, but they are almost all the same in most boost recharge 10%, they all improve endurance 4%, they all boost accuracy, they all boost psionic resistance. Some boost HP, some boost other attributes, but they are a lot more similar than different. And none of those sets boost defense or resist. I keep wondering where the very rare Heal set is. Not like I'd be using it for much, but it more options are almost always welcome. Just don't do the lame thing that was done with Experienced Marksman. Each of those recipes in the set all take the exact same ingredients. As for fear sets...candidly, I'm only just now finding a reason to even use fear. To date, I have never even taken a fear power, as it does no damage. Kind of useless to someone like me who will take any dps over no dps. But now, I'm leaning more into damage mitigation, as opposed to dps. If they're not hitting me, I don't need to spend a ton on defense and resistance. I am not an authority on any decision making with HC, but I have a hunch they upgraded the council and CoT for a reason. More defense and resistance options would negate at least some of the reason for those changes. Wouldn't they?

It is cool. It puts you that much closer to 40 merits. Badges are great, but merits are better.

This is by no means a surprise to most of you, but just in an effort to be helpful, figured I'd share this: If, for whatever reason, you aren't keeping track of where you're at, and the morality mission didn't drop, if you do another tip mission of the same alignment, your count remains at 10/10, but the badge progression DOES give you credit for it, even if the game won't until you do the morality mission. Unfortunately, despite the game keeping track of the number of tip missions our characters have done - this isn't a retroactive badge. You have to complete the 25 alignment missions for credit for the 3 new badges. To be fair, with Null the gull and the instant changes of alignments, it could be that count the game shows under the Alignment tab is completely thrown off.

Oh, come on. Do us a favor. I can sense you're terribly burdened with it all.

So, regarding the Labyrinth, the only issue I ran into was when fighting the minotaur after the league did a certain amount of damage to him, we ( I presume all of us) were prompted to join the minotaur in some arena, and after acceptance, it seemed like every 10 seconds or so, I was asked again. I kept saying yes, because I wasn't sure if it was some easy way out if we didn't feel like we were making a dent. Other than that - folks who didn't visit brainstorm have tons of questions. I had some answers and shared what I knew, as did others. But I am certain there will be more questions to come from other folks who didn't/don't read.

Well done! I remember my first billion on HC. That was back when catalysts sold for 5M each. Not instantly, but overnight. The economy now seems to have a lot more variation in prices, so patience can definitely save you some inf, and you can still make a decent stack, but it's going to take longer in some cases, because nowadays, everyone seems to know how to craft/convert/sell, thanks to @Yomo Kimyata and others spilling the beans on the mysteries of the HC CoH economy. Why, Yomo? Why did you have to give all the secrets away? I don't want this competition! Just kidding. Well done! Now that you have a stack - are you going to use it to get more? Or are you just going to spend it?

You have a high bar for suggestions, I see. Perhaps you put a great deal of time and thought into your own suggestions. I never do. I merely ask myself if it would be interesting or fun. The "Can it be done" or "Should it be done" never enter my mind. Still, I had an additional thought that should never and will never be implemented - and that is a thought that occurred to me during this mornings row on the C2 erg. As I get tired, I noticed I have a tendency to over-reach. My form breaks down. Same with dumbbell curls, that I do in between 500 meter reps. As the dumbbell approaches near that halfway point where the full weight is more noticeable, there's a tendency to lean back and cheat. As fatigue enters the body, form breaks down. Yet, this doesn't happen with our characters. Sure - there are instances where our stamina is so low we don't have enough to execute the attack, but if we can hit a bullseye at 150 feet in a rested state, odds are we can't do that if we're tired. If the power takes 10 pts of endurance, and we have 20 in game, no problem. Our toHit and accuracy formula gets calculated, and how tired our characters are don't enter into the formula. It's along the same lines of the -accuracy we used to have from having a travel power on. It's the difference between hitting a stationary target or a moving one. (big difference, need more skill and practice) Even harder when the target and you are moving. (would like to try this in real life with a bow and arrow, but I'm too cheap to buy the bow) Thankfully, our characters don't suffer from -accuracy unless debuffed. It would be less fun and more annoying if they did. I see that. And yet...it's interesting. At least it is to me.