Ukase

For the most part, I think this is not always true - but mostly true. I keep getting peeved when I see the term "blapper", as any blaster will go into melee fairly often. It's a useless term. You can call yourself a blapper if you like, but you'll be a blaster in my eyes. Think about the mental manipulation secondary. Blasters with this powerset are in melee at least every 30-45 seconds just to get their endurance rate up. The idea that a blaster was designed to play at range is simply inaccurate. While it's certainly safer to be at range, melee is where the action is for fire blasters with fire sword circle and Inferno. For an ice blaster with the targeted Blizzard, cast relatively safely from a difference - and a couple of ranged holds...this powerset for a blaster is much better designed for range play. But, it still gets a few melee attacks, because, like it or not, you're either going to be proactive and go into melee, or melee is going to come to you. Energy secondary is hilarious. Talk about mind games. All those KB powers designed to confuse the player. Am I melee or ranged? They come near, I attack, now they're 40 feet away. There's a synergy there to take advantage of, if you're solo, or aren't teamed with fussy scrappers who hate to use the F key (and I get it). But sacrificing a slot just to knock something down when that slot could be used for more damage, accuracy and recharge...um...no. I'll use the Overwhelming force damage/kb to kd in almost every build if I can. I'll never use Sudden Acceleration's KB to KD unless I'm chasing the 6th bonus of that set. (A whole 'nother topic there) Sorry, I'm being too wordy, as usual. In short, range and melee are both good modes of play, but doing both is working with the sets you get, whereas only doing one or the other is kind of going against the grain of the design of the AT and the powersets. Maybe a Sentinel is a better fit for some of us. No shame in that. I cannot play every blaster powerset very well. Great at ice, and energy and fire. Okay at water. Suck at dark and time.

So...when the page 5 changes hit...it took me a while to adjust. I was irritated to the point where I just stopped farming altogether. Then, after a brief break, I revisited the problem. The problem was me. I was so focused on the solution to afk I had implemented, I was just convinced it should still work, but it didn't. I would read these posts about how for AFK, a tank was the better choice. Yeah. Sure. Maybe for what your goals are, go ahead. My goal has nothing to do with speed. It's afk. It could take all day to clear a map, and that'd be okay. My primary goal is to accrue emp merits for my alts so I can t-3 them when they ding 50 in short order, rather than suffer the fickle rng reward table. Some time ago, a friend shared with me something he thought was ingenious - and I thought so to. Rescue an NPC, and follow it. The rescue is done by burn on auto. The F key for follow is pressed just before you tab out, with the hostage needing rescue being the one to follow. It was a stone tank - before the changes to stone took place, so it went very slow, which was perfect. Plenty of time for burn and the damage aura to dispatch all the npcs that would invariably march by as the freed hostage made its way to the entrance. It was the Atta map, so there were a number of obstacles, and after trying various things, like hovering low to the ground to minimize this, I basically decided I'd just have to tab back in every so often and set the farmer on the right path, if it got obstructed. With the page 5 changes, you could still do this, but with the -def changes that never appeared for me in the combat log, it was just death waiting on me when I would return. Regen and HP were the keys. And still trying to keep recharge up. So, this was a problem I didn't have the patience to solve. I mean, I don't really need the emp merits, as before page 5, I had accrued a nice stack of t-merits for the next dozen or so alts. And then, I was bored or something and I think I wanted to grab something from the farmer's salvage, maybe some catalysts. No matter - it got me misty eyed, thinking of this fantastic farmer that I had actually leveled up outside of the farm. It already had the 4 passive accolades, because all my 50's that I play get those as just a matter of course. I saw the build that America generously shared for the rad/fire brute. I made a 2nd farmer. and the poor first farmer stalls at vet level 2780. Almost 5 years old. I had never thought to take it into AE when I made it. See the technology origin? That was going to be for freakshow, and I'd planned to utilize the SO drops as I leveled up - and I did - because I didn't have the big stacks of inf I have now. I adapted to the ridiculously implemented end sappers that were suddenly out in the wild because of these folks who I can only tangentially relate to on alternate weekends thought they needed more challenge in the game - and that's a whole 'nother topic. And, finally, I have adapted to the new way of AFK farming for Spines/Fire brutes. Screw the tanks and their piss poor damage. Yes, you need to hp accolades. But for me - I get those anyway. I give you an imperfect, but certainly acceptable spines/fire build for +4/8 afk farming (the map I use doesn't have EBs. EBs do not help me reach my goals at any greater rate. No promises are made about maps with EBs.) If I can trust that the map 44188 (bloodom's 40 minute map) has "100% XP", then this build works - most of the time. More often than not - I do not tab back in to see a corpse. I see purples, threads and emp merits. The ridiculous idea of putting a set of purples in brawl and boxing are set aside, sacrificing that bit of recharge for more fire defense. If you care to use it, feel free. If you want to nitpick, go ahead. I won't listen, because it's working for what I want it to do. I'm sure there are "better builds". But this build is perfect for me for right now. SpinesfireBrute - Brute (Spines - Fiery Aura).mbd

First, I want to thank you for sharing. I was beginning to think it was just Snarky who had experiences like this. This is just my first thought: too bad you had a rough time of it. My second thought: Glad I can afford Summons from the newly re-named START vendor so I can solo these if I feel like it. I think with the influx of newer players, unless we only solo or play with folks we know, we're ALL going to experience things like this every so often, if not more frequently. Team play can be challenging to do well for a lot of people. Some teams have leaders who recruit and never say anything to actually lead. Some teams have players who genuinely don't know, or don't care about any impact their play will have on your enjoyment. Last night, I was watching a 2*LGTF over Discord. And while I can certainly understand each side in a minor debate, there was a moment where a tank was a little frustrated because they couldn't get a Feral Kraken to move - because it was immobilized by fire cages and perhaps some tenebrous tentacles. And, for those that have done advanced LGTF, if there's a Suit about to die, it can be important to position targets and the team itself to more opportunistic areas. To their credit, they got through it unscathed, but it raised some teaching moments for all parties involved. Unfortunately, unless someone takes the time to type stuff out, nobody is going to learn anything. I have been on teams like this, where one or more are going off, doing their thing. I have no problems typing. Just look at this wall of words I've typed already! Me: It may be a good idea to not click the glowies until we've dealt with Clamor and her cronies. We might be able to handle the ambush, but why risk it? I pretty much say that during every Yin I've done since I learned it was the glowies that triggered the ambush. I've only had one team say, "We can handle it". And we did. Heck, we were all fifties, I think. Or mostly 50s. So, yeah, we should be able to handle that. Still, proactive communication - done in such a way where your preferences are posed as suggestions instead of mandates generally go well. Just my two inf. Thanks again for sharing. Sorry you had a rough one.

So, in the spirit of transparency, I suppose it depends on what you're doing, but I did ensure my character had the best it could afford - which because of an affinity for buying low and selling high, was as good as I could get. And I didn't raise the difficulty until 24. And even then it was just +1. But by 28, it was +2, and at 31 it was +3. I waited until 38, I think and found I could survive +4, but it took too long. But it was nice not to whiff like many of my characters do - with an ability to boost accuracy AND ToHit. The "immediate" respec, it was annoying, like every other respec. Mainly because of the timing. There was a TF I'd wanted to get in on, but I didn't want to run around untrained. Still, it was a lot of fun, the bane.

I saw a "Wafer Thin Mint" a few days ago. I chuckled. My concern is they make an evil alter ego Mr. Creosote. Sadly, our huge characters aren't quite huge enough, but that might be a bit too close to the IP of Monty Python.

Hey, can you elaborate on this? Is there a spreadsheet or something you used? Don't mean to be a pita, just curious as to what the method of testing was. And like..what does difficulty 13 even mean?

For me, buffs don't matter...until they do. For the most part, any buff that makes a stat "blue" or caps an attribute that I don't have capped without buffs...I just love that. So, an emp with fort or AB, a kin with fulcrum shift, or a cold with the ice shield + frostwork...all that stuff is great. But the one buff I like more than any other is Adrenaline Boost. So, yeah, I get that a dark/dark is going to be more valuable for harder content in most cases. But, I still love me some AB.

This is part of the reason why most folks afk after putting a ranged attack on auto-fire through their HVAS. To avoid this kind of thing. I will confess - I do tend to bore people with the absolute worst dad jokes I can find on the internet during an MSR, but only if it seems like folks could use a break from the silence. To the OP - you mention it was your first MSR. Congrats! For your next one, I encourage you to listen to some AC/DC Thunderstruck as you whack into a rikti or three. Then, once the GM is down, press the C key on your keyboard. The need for instructions is over. All you have left to do is endure the 30 minutes until the shields go back up. You can just fight or buff with reckless abandon (to a degree - you should still stay near or in the bowl unless you're a tank or brute, or an epic utilizing some buffs to keep you moving). But there's no need to let the chatter of others ruin your fun. When the shields go up, you can press C and the chat box comes back up. Your odds of missing anything important are very low. Alternatively - you can create a tab that displays private messages and keep THAT chat box open in case someone has something to tell you, specifically. and then press C to close the league chat, leaving your Direct Message tab open. I'd say ignore the folks who are doing the foul speaking, but that might take too long, and the ol' ignore button is kind of a last resort (at least it is for me)

This was very much appreciated!

So, the sad part is - as far as I know - without using the wiki, or asking someone, there's no way to definitively KNOW which offering is the start of an arc, and which is the start of some random repeatable mission. But here's a clue: As mentioned previously, there's that blue text - which USUALLY indicates a story arc. But, in this case, it's a badge mission. Maria Jenkins will trip you up in a similar fashion with her offering of a mission to defeat Marauder. It's got that nifty blue text, but it's not an arc with multiple missions. It's just for a badge. Ultimately, I think the best way to know is to use the HC Wiki. I think most players tend to have that site, along with City of Data, open when they play.

I think on the plus side for infiltration, you can at least slot for end reduction. I know when I'd be getting to level 7 or 8, leaving ninja run on, I'd be running out of endurance if I got into a scrape with some hellions and forgot to turn it off.

So, in all seriousness - brawl is great, right out of the gate - unslotted. You'd never think a character can get Cataclysmic badge from brawl, but that is how it is done the fastest. (arguably) Now, when I say in all seriousness, I'm being serious. But I'm not being entirely transparent. I use it in Mender Remiel's first mission to smack AVs until they're at 70-75% health, then switch to a different AV, and hopefully, the first one will have regen'd enough for me to continue. Certain farm builds will use brawl (and boxing) as set mules for faster recharge. Who'd of thunk you'd see a set of Absolute Amazement in brawl? Not me. But I have seen it. As for infiltration, I think the folks that take it are likely the same folks that are perfectly fine with ninja run or a jet pack as their travel power. And if it works for them, great.

Just so you folks know - I made another 40M overnight just by selling 20 insps. Again, this morning, just one super team red left. Granted, 40M is small change for some of us, but I feel badly getting this much when I'm not asking that much. And I don't even have to convert anything. Would love to see some competition here, so my lowbies can spend a million, fill up their trays with supers and blow through some content faster than otherwise.

a tip I read from one of Nemu's posts - proc that arctic breath. It's amazing all by itself.

I thought for sure I put a response to this and looked through it and didn't see one. According to the poll, I'm in the top 2.27%. Each character I have, unless I'm leveling the character up (they start with zero, usually) will have 1B on hand. Emails each have 1 inf shy of 1B across multiple accounts. Because we can only hold 100 emails, I had to make another account because I just don't have the creativity to make a character to specifically hold inf, and the email is 100X more convenient than logging a character off, then back on to access the funds. The reason for the holding only 1B, is if they hold more, then I have to work with the AH or another character to do something with the inf on hand to grab the email. As far as contests go, I might stop and watch, but I rarely even think about participating. If I were to win, it would take the prize from someone who likely would need it more than me. Now, if you have a contest offering 100B, maybe I'll think about it.

When you say "whomever is objective"...that's about 4 feet over my head. And I didn't really come here for grammar/English lessons. But - the latter part IS useful. Thanks.

So...we hear/read all this talk about DDR, and that's why Shield is slightly better than Bio. And we hear frequently how Fire is so bad, as it lacks DDR, it lacks KB protection, and Freem certainly likes to take advantage of that! It's difficult to pin down a "worst" armor, because while it may be "worst" for your tank, it could be just fine for a scrapper or a brute. Or vice-versa. I read/heard someone suggest that because scrappers have a lower resist cap, it made more sense for the scrapper to use a defensive armor. I'm not sure just why they think that, but they have their reasons, whoever they are. (or is it whomever? - Yeah, I think it's whomever. But I'm not gonna change it.) Over the years, I've been able to play a stone tank like it was a weak dominator without domination. I mean, I've even had a tank not be able to defeat trap door due to bad tactics. I am just not a great tanker, no matter what tank I'm on. So, there's your answer. The worst armor is whichever armor is on the tank I'm playing. In all seriousness, I'd say regen is the worst because it doesn't have any mitigation aside from more regen and higher hp.

Ancient Secret. My guess is Calgon.

I could ask one of my daughters about that..she could probably come up with a pretty good guide. It starts with using your first 100M to buy 100 Reward merits for a badge from Luna.

My only question is - did you do all this math from memory, or did you actually have to look up the formula. I realize the formulas are available on one wiki or another, for just about as long as the game's been around. At least, I think so. I haven't been around since the game first came out, but I recall using Paragon Wiki quite a bit, but I'm not real clear when - but I've lost my focus - I've just very curious as to whether or not you literally have the game that well mastered, or did you sneak a peek at City of Data and or HCWiki?

So, often I'll try to hurry things along in a story arc and look to super inspirations to help me do this. And, if there's an AV, or if I'm on a team, I will look to use Super inspirations. I usually get these from my base. But, occasionally, like in a Sutter, perhaps, there are multiple AVs on a team that has low DPS. So, the ones I arrive with get spent, and in between missions I'll just use the /AH. And...well, the folks that like this niche (if anyone) aren't checking in often enough. 3 super lucks? That's it? Wonder how much they're listed for that they're still in stock. No matter. My point is - supply of these is sometimes lower than I'd like. So, being the opportunist, this is how that went down. It's not real clear to me why I haven't been taking more consistent advantage - other than trying to keep my SG bins filled with them to make things faster when I am leveling up.

So, I think you've just re-created an option to bring into the pixel world what we used to do as kids, called "Tag". You see an interesting name, you quickly use /sea (or /search, or Find Member, and if they're of a different alignment, you're really going to have to hustle to change your alignment. Or, if you know the zone they're in, you can type /search +abyss (or whatever zone you think they're in) The game will let you know if you click on their name in the results if they're close by, and well...then it's just a matter of moving around to see if you're getting closer or farther. It's not perfect, because it's against the rules to let them know you're trying to find them. They could zone out. But, generally speaking, you can find them if you're quick and determined. And yes, lol, point taken. A lot of work.

I'm afraid you might be disappointed. The origin of Ukase has been changed many times since the character concept was first created in issue 3. The name stems from the Marvel comic series "Secret Wars". Doctor Doom had a code name, or password he used to "awaken" Ultron 5. That was "Ukase Rex". On retail, the character stuck with the full name of Ukase Rex. But, as you can imagine, with all the different players also using Rex in their names, I didn't want folks getting confused, so I dropped the Rex sometime around issue 17, maybe? I can't recall. I think the retail version of the origin story was something along the lines of some interstellar romance abandoning the child with a bartender in Talos Island. I actually have it saved on a hard drive, along with the old Sentinel file - but I've yet to hook the old HDD to this new rig to see it. Maybe one day, I'll take a look. As for the Bane that I made...his name is Yogurt Justice.

For the first time - ever- in my lengthy time of playing CoH, I made a Soldier of Arachnos. In the early levels, it felt like a very weak, but sturdy blaster. Kind of like an AR/Shield Sentinel..if such a thing can exist in nature. When I made this character, the only reason to make it was to milk a silly joke that I stole from a member of Cosmic Council that I heard a few years ago. About the Tuatha having some secret affiliation with yogurt. Why else would they be called Tuatha De Dannon? Again, not my silly thought. Too bad. Would love to claim it. So, of course, the first thing I did was grab 10 Prismatics, head to the Benovolab vendor...and become disappointed. I couldn't resemble a Tuatha. But that's neither here nor there. Upon reaching 24, I had the instant respec and went the Bane route. I have done widow before and found it just putrid. If Kaizen Soze's Widows make music, mine were like fingernails on a chalkboard. I'm sure that has more to do with me and my playstyle than the powersets. This bane, however, has been surprisingly fantastic. In the low 30's the dps wasn't anything to be excited about. It played like a lower dps stalker/scrapper. But, once I got into the mid 30's and could put some more slots in some attacks, I am puzzled as to why I don't see more of these on pugs. While the journey isn't over yet - level 46 at the moment - this is really a fine character. The only thing I wish it had is a taunt of some kind. Plenty of AoE. A satisfying crunch that makes me think fondly of my Shield/Mace tank. And my mace/fire scrapper. A critical hit with the opening attack. A fantastic stealth. A number of toggles that don't require endurance? What's not to like? There are a lot of options to experience with this character. It feels so much more well-designed than the kheldians. While, still not quite as much fun for me as ice blasting, this character may very well find itself on my first page of characters replacing...something. Not sure yet. But I did want to encourage those of you, like me, for whatever your reasons, put off making an SoA, to do so. And wow. Arctic Breath. Not a fan of cones, but with damage procs, this is a heck of an attack. It may just be Frost from ice melee, renamed and reskinned. Seems like it. I'll be looking into Mako's patron pool a lot more after this. Hard to believe I've never even tried it out before. I know Troo has his internet dice for us to use if we aren't sure of what our next character will be, but I'd say at least try an SoA if you haven't already. It seems a lot sturdier than any of my scrappers or stalkers, which is odd for a set of armor that's only using a steadfast, a glad armor and an unbreakable guard unique in it. (and the numerous defensive toggles)

There's a proverb that states many counsels assure victory. I'm no authority on hard modes. Or even advanced math. But I do know words. A lot of them. And the biggest key is what Doomguide2005 stated it is. Reading, and/or I suppose, if you're on Discord, actively listening. I'm not what I would consider a highly skilled player compared to others I've teamed with in the past. Just a notch above average on a good day. But, if the team just takes things one mob at a time, the entire 1*tf is time consuming, but easy enough if you've done it before.