Trickshooter

Autohit powers have no effect on the streak breaker. Pets, of any kind, each have their own streak breaker record, tracked independently of their owner. I see from your log that you activated Web Grenade, and there is no report of it either missing or hitting. Is it possible the hits are just not showing up in the combat log? I don't know why that would happen, because I'm pretty sure hits and misses are the same channel, but Web Envelope is an AoE and it can miss twice as long as there was one successful hit in between the misses. Do you remember if some enemies were affected by it?

Kora Fruit was downgraded with the last patch before the launch of Issue 7: https://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Patch_Notes/2006-04-11#City_Zones Inspiration storage was added with Issue 7: https://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Patch_Notes/2006-06-06#Bases

Yes! If only I could find the original sounds it had right before it went live. I can't even remember what they sounded like anymore, but I remember liking it and then the sounds changed to the racecar sounds with no explanation and was pushed live not long after.

I think many people know that Power Boost won't affect powers with enhanceable Damage Resistance, but I feel like much less people know why. I just tried my best to explain the relationship that causes this quirk, since it's not exactly intuitive.

For years during the original run of City of Heroes, and even now, this question, or similar ones, has been asked. Many of us know to explain that [Insert Power] is immune to the effects of [Insert effect] because Damage buffs and Damage resistance don't get along (or maybe get along TOO well). For most people, the response to that is, "What?" Because seriously, what? How does that make sense? Well, I'm going to explain it for you. First, we need to review some game terminology: Attributes Attributes are basically the power effects in game. Most powers are basically a series of Attributes with assigned values. They include, but are not limited to: Heal Endurance (not like your endurance bar, but rather EndGain and EndDrain effects) ToHit Base Defense AoE Defense Melee Defense Ranged Defense Smashing Defense Lethal Defense Fire Defense Cold Defense Energy Defense Negative Energy Defense Psionic Defense Toxic Defense (yes, and there might be a separate post on this) Lethal Damage Smashing Damage Fire Damage Cold Damage Energy Damage Negative Energy Damage Psionic Damage Toxic Damage Hold Duration Immob Duration Sleep Duration Stun Duration Terrorize Duration Confuse Duration Run Speed Fly Speed Etc. Worth noting here is the inclusion of Defense, but not Damage Resistance. We'll come back to this soon, but we have another term to learn first. Strength Strength increases or decreases the values of Attributes. The simplest example of Strength in effect are Enhancements, but there are plenty of Strength effects in the game, including Power Boost, some Set Bonuses and some power effects, like Nature Affinity's Bloom.* This is why when trying to calculate how something will perform once fully slotted and with all applicable sources of Strength (again, like Power Boost, set bonuses, etc.), you add them all together first. They are the same effect. For example, if you had a power that had a 100 Heal effect and 3-slotted it with SOs, the Heal would be increased to roughly 100 * 1.976, or a 197.6 Heal. If you then also applied a +25% Str(Heal) to yourself, maybe from set bonuses, that Heal would be increased to 100 * 2.226, or a 222.6 Heal. And here is where part of the strangeness between Damage buffs and Damage resistance begins. Because for most of the effects in the game we might consider buffs or debuffs, such as +/-ToHit or +/-Defense, the Attributes themselves are the effect, and Strength increases or decreases their values to make them stronger or weaker. But when it comes to +/-Damage, there is no Attribute; the different damage types are each their own Attribute and the corresponding Strength for each type is what buffs or debuffs their base values. So the "Lethal Damage" Attribute is just Lethal damage and to increase or decrease it, you would use Str(Lethal Damage), and likewise for all the different damage types. A level 50 Damage SO is +33% Strength to the 8 damage types. A Blaster’s Build Up is +100% Strength to the 8 damage types. And a Defender’s Siphon Power is -25% Strength to the 8 damage types. On its own, this is no issue. It's just slightly different application from other effects we’d consider “buffs”. But going back to the lack of Damage Resistance Attributes, and thus the lack of Damage Resistance Strength, how then does Damage Resistance work? How is it buffed or debuffed? Well that brings us to our next term. Resistance Resistance is probably the simplest to understand. Resistance decreases or increases how much an attribute can affect an entity. For the most part, these effects are fairly straightforward.** For example, a positive Resistance to Sleep duration will reduce the length of a Sleep effect, and a negative one will increase the length of a Sleep effect. A positive Resistance to ToHit will predictably reduce the value of a ToHit debuff, but also a ToHit buff. This is why many buff effects like this are flagged to ignore Resistance (see on City of Data as Unresistable). But probably the most common throughout the game is Resistance to the Damage types. And the game tends to display these to us similarly to how they're actually set up: Res(Lethal), Res(Smashing), etc. A positive Resistance to a damage type will reduce the damage we take from that type, and a negative one will increase the damage. Now that you know these three terms and how they apply to the game, you might be starting to see the relationship between damage, damage buffs, and damage resistance. But here is the real kicker when it comes to Strength and Resistance: One can affect the other. 😮 I'd like to picture that this is a GASP moment, but I guess I haven't fully explained what that means. So let's look at an example of this in game. We'll use Scrapper/Super Reflexes/Focused Senses first: This power grants a base +13.875% Ranged Defense. A single level 50 Defense SO Enhancement acts as a +20% Strength to all the Defense types, including Ranged Defense, increasing the base value to 13.875 x 1.2, or +16.65% Ranged Defense. However, at level 50 this power also grants an enhanceable +13.84% Res(Base Defense), which we would understand as Defense Debuff Resistance, and that SO includes +20% Str(Base Defense). Since we know that Strength can affect Resistance, this increases the value to 13.84 x 1.2, or about 16.61% Res(Base Defense). Okay, sure. That makes sense, right? Well, let's look at Tanker/Invulnerability/Temp Invulnerability now: This power grants a base +30% Res(Smashing Damage) and +30% Res(Lethal Damage). A single level 50 Damage Resist SO Enhancements acts as a... wait. What does a Damage Resist Enhancement grant if there is no Strength for Damage Resistance? Funny you should ask. In the same way the Res(Base Defense) of Focused Senses is increased by Str(Base Defense), the way to increase Res(Smashing Damage) is with... Str(Smashing Damage). But... didn’t we just learn that’s a damage buff? Yep. So then a Damage Resist Enhancement must grant Strength to the 8 damage types to work? Yep. And does a Damage Enhancement also grant Strength to the 8 damage types? Yep. So Damage Resist and Damage Enhancements are the same effect? Yep. So back to our example using Temp Invulnerability, a single level 50 Damage Resist SO Enhancement acts as a +20% Strength to all damage types, including Smashing Damage and Lethal Damage, increasing their base values to 30 x 1.2, or +36% Res(Smashing Damage) and Res(Lethal Damage). Okay, so big deal, Damage Resist Enhancements and Damage Enhancements are the same thing. That doesn’t change much, right? Well, not much for Enhancements, no. But Enhancements are only one source of Strength in the game. What if our Tanker in the above example was given Fortitude by a Defender teammate? A Defender’s Fortitude includes a +31.25% Strength to all the Damage types. Does this mean our Tanker’s Resistance will also be increased by an additional 31.25%? Nope! But why? Didn’t we just learn that that is how it should work? Well yes, but steps have been taken to prevent that effect from happening! The reason the Defender’s damage buff won’t increase the Resistances of Temp Invulnerability is a little flag on Temp Invulnerability telling it to ignore Strength from outside sources (i.e. any source other than slotted Enhancements). You can see this on City of Data as Not affected by outside buffs/debuffs. This prevents damage buffs such as those from Fortitude, Fulcrum Shift, Build Up or just chewing a bunch of red inspirations from drastically increasing Damage Resistance effects. This is one of two methods power developers have to prevent this situation.*** The other is to allow outside Strength from outside sources, but any Damage Resistance effects in the power are individually flagged to ignore Strength. You can see this on City of Data as Ignores Enhancements & Buffs. So how does this relate to the question in the header: Why doesn’t Power Boost work on Cold Shields? Well, the original developers chose to allow the Cold Shields to slot Enhancements for the Damage Resistance they grant. This meant that the first method had to be used and both Shields had to be flagged to ignore Strength from outside sources (or Not affected by outside buffs/debuffs) such as Power Boost. Otherwise, damage buffs would also increase the Damage Resistance. What makes that different from the Force Field Shields? Deflection Shield also grants Damage Resistance. The difference is that Deflection Shield’s Damage Resistance can’t benefit from Enhancements. The power doesn’t accept Damage Resistance Enhancements, and even if it could, the effect is flagged Ignores Enhancements & Buffs. This allows Deflection Shield to benefit from outside sources of Strength, such as Power Boost. *Notably, Dominator's Domination is not a Strength effect; it's functionally like flipping a switch that activates longer, stronger mez values already built in to the Dominator's powers that only activate as long as that switch is flipped. **Resistance is very different from what we might call "Protection". Protection is a separate term used to describe whether an effect with a Magnitude, such as many Mez effects, will be able to affect an entity at all. It is not a true effect like Resistance, but rather a preemptive application of negative Magnitude to someone that a power with a positive Magnitude value must overcome before mez duration is considered at all. ***Now this is basically how it’s supposed to be done, but it’s not automatic. These have to be manually done, so there are some powers that are double prevented, such as Link Minds, not being affected by Power Boost, but also being unenhanceable. But then there are also powers that have neither, such as Fade, which has enhanceable Damage Resistance that gets unintentionally increased by Damage buffs.

Now that's an interesting idea.

Power Boost can't work like that for Damage Resistance. And unfortunately it's complicated to explain why, but I'm gonna try anyway. Power Boost works by granting Str to certain Attributes (e.g. Increasing Heal requires Str(Heal), increase ToHit Buffs or Debuffs requires Str(ToHit), etc.). This is how Enhancements work, as well. Negative Str values are how we get effects for powers like Weaken and Benumb. Damage Resistance doesn't use Str(DamageResistance) because that's not a thing; there is no DamageResistance Attribute. And this is where the wonky relationship between Damage Buffs and Damage Resistance comes in. Because what also doesn't exist is Str(Damage). Damage is not an Attribute; instead, each damage type is its own Attribute. So there's Str(Lethal), Str(Smashing), etc. And unlike other Str effects, these don't increase or decrease damage buffs and debuffs; they are just damage buffs or debuffs themselves. Along with Str effects... are Res effects. Res effects lower the amount that an Attribute can affect you (or increase it if the Res value is negative). So Res(Heal) increases your resistance to Heals, Res(ToHit) increases your resistance to ToHit debuffs, but also buffs (which is why many buffs are flagged Unresistable), etc. And the way Damage Resistance works is as Res(Lethal), Res(Smashing), etc. It lowers the amount the damage types can affect you. BUT (and this is the real kicker)... Str effects can also buff the strength of Res effects (which is why most resistances to debuffs and mez are flagged Ignore Enhancements and Buffs, so that you can't increase them). So because damage buffs and debuffs share the same Attributes (the damage types) with damage resistance, damage buffs will increase the damage resistance. In fact, Damage Enhancements and Damage Resistance Enhancements are the same effect, Str to each of the damage types. This is why the game messes up displaying both effects for powers that accept both Damage and Damage Resistance enhancements (like the Summon Demons power). To get around this craziness, a power is either: 1) Allowed to enhance Damage Resistance within the power, but flagged to ignore outside buffs/debuffs (to block out Str except for those granted by enhancements) OR 2) Allowed to be affected by outside buffs/debuffs (such as Power Boost/Weaken), but Damage Resistance effects within the power are unenhanceable (so that just the Resistance effects themselves are blocked from from damage buffs) tl;dr Power Boost can't strengthen Damage Resistance effects because the way to strengthen Damage Resistance is with Damage buffs and Damage Resistance powers are set up specifically to avoid that happening.

Fade definitely needs that flag and I consider it a bug that it never got it. Without it, it's Damage Resistance effects can be buffed by Damage buffs. Farsight is definitely very powerful, but I wouldn't say it's defense values are the problem. If anything, it's the uptime that makes Farsight too good.

It's likely sending a message for each damage resistance type that is being lowered (L/S/F/C/E/N/P/T), as each one is its own effect in a power.

It's working as intended. Your pets technically "die" when you enter a mission and new ones are automatically resummoned once you've loaded in.

Mastermind's Empty Clips is definitely an outlier, likely in need of review, but for the most part Mastermind endurance costs are only 25% higher. And even that is only a technically true statement. There is a formula for endurance cost that is (mostly) based on the damage scale caused by a power. Mastermind Primary and Secondary powerset endurance costs typically follow this formula with no penalty. For the most part, they are paying the calculated endurance cost based on the formula. However, every other AT's Primary and Secondary powerset endurance costs are calculated at only 80% of the normal value, giving them a 20% discount on the base cost.* So really, Masterminds have normal endurance costs; everyone else just pays less! *This is not something you would see in-game anywhere, as base endurance cost is not something calculated dynamically. It is a set value put in by whichever powers designer built the associated power. Also, this does not extend to power pools and epic pools.

Superior Invisibility does not suppress from attacking or being attacked, only when clicking a glowie, so the Cabal's Positioning effect would not trigger stealth suppression for it like it would with other stealth powers. Stalker's Hide is also slightly different from most stealth powers, as it will only suppress from an enemy "attack" if damage is done.

I feel some Psionic powers lacking a positional defense is a reasonable trade off for the many more debuffs that lack a damage type defense, and to fix one without the other would be kind of unfair. And that could be quite a lot of work. Also, if they did fix both, Mind Control would need some reworking, because that whole set's "secondary effect" is that many enemies lack the specific psionic type defense to dodge them. Add a positional defense to those powers and Mind is basically Fire without its DoT, Elec without its End Drain, etc. My point is, it could be opening up a can of worms. It's not impossible, but would probably need quite a bit of time to pull off and then test thoroughly.

Consume has given a flat 50% Endurance Drain resistance since Issue 18.

Regarding Vengeful Slice, looks like you're right: the Tanker version's Knockdown is missing the flag that limits it to the initial target. It becomes an AoE because the power itself is secretly an AoE to make Gauntlet work. Regarding Consume, it doesn't give Resistance to Recovery Debuffs, it gives Resistance to Endurance Drain, which isn't an attribute that can monitored, I don't think.

Just to be clear, are you trying these out with enemies in melee range? The buffs of the Melee branch are based on the number enemies within a certain radius around you, however the Core branch front-loads some of this buff, which might be what you're seeing if you tested without an enemy within range.

If Sky Splitter ever had AoE damage on a Tanker, it was a bug. The attack has always been meant to be ST. The 9 ft radius and 5 target limit on Sky Splitter for Tankers is only meant for the effect of Gauntlet. Nearly all Tanker attacks are secretly AoEs in order to facilitate the passive AoE taunt of Gauntlet, but the other effects of their attacks (except those attacks explicitly meant to be AoE) are limited by a flag that prevents the effect from extending beyond the initial target. It looks like there might have been a bug where the bonus damage from having 3 levels of Perfection when activated were missing their "single-target only" limiters, and now it's fixed. I can't speak for the issue of the self buffs being bugged.

This is just a display issue and it happens with other henchmen that can be slotted for damage and damage resistance (like the Ember Demon). The pet's actual powers should function at the correct value.

Unfortunately most of them are only a chance to occur.

Realistically, the best solution probably would have been to make Thunderous Blast match Overcharge and Geyser when all the nukes were rebalanced in Issue 24, but lowering it's damage lower than the other legacy nukes might have been seen as nerfing a set that was already considered weak by most of the playerbase.

I just want to add that I would love for Tesla Cage to do more damage and for Short Circuit to animate faster. I think those are solid suggestions, and while some people are going to be averse to change simply because they love a set/power just fine as it is, I think overall most people would (eventually lol) be very happy with those changes.

Off the top of my head, I would say if anything, Geyser and Overcharge are really the problem in the comparison to Thunderous Blast, but I wouldn't want to get them nerfed. 🤐

Well, really by my logic, Rain of Arrows and Geyser should just be doing less damage, and they already do. Rain of Arrows specifically has to make a tohit check with each tic and server timing typically makes it only hit twice, so usually only scale 2.4 damage. Geyser seems out of place maybe, but it lines up with the only other comparable nuke, which is Overcharge. Thunderous Blast is basically the only nuke that functions the way it does, so it's hard to compare to another nuke and say "hey, this seems off." About 2/3s of the nukes fall in to two groups that are easier to compare (the PBAoEs, and then Overcharge+Geyser), but all the other ones are basically unique and it's hard to say specifically why certain values were picked for damage or recharge (because as Vanden said, the damage formula has never really applied to them, and even if it did, range is not included in the formulas), but we know the basic reason always comes down to trying to balance risk vs. reward. So considering risk vs. reward: Thunderous Blast does the damage of the PBAoE nukes, but from 60 ft away. Yes, it does take longer to animate, but you can use Thunderous Blast before enemies even know you're there, so the animation time in that situation is only annoying, unlike for the PBAoEs where it could potentially lead to a faceplant before the damage actually occurs. I can't really comment on Sentinels, because my opinion there would probably just be that they just weren't balanced correctly and need their damage/recharge times revisited.

They do less damage. Is that 0.5 scale extra damage worth the extra 45 second recharge? I don't know, I'm just saying there was a reason why it's recharge is longer. Also, I don't think Thunderous Blast's damage is done in tics? It splits the damage type, but it does it all at once last I checked.

Because it can be used from 60 ft away, unlike the others that are PBAoE.