JCServant

These look nice! If I can afford these one day, I might give 'em a try and circle back 😄 I'm a more casual player who mostly runs in the 10-40ish range using SOs (though, for controllers, I usually pony up for a few sets to help out their woefully low offense). Just eyeballing it through, most of these would certainly still work even if wolf didn't have fear howl...and would definately work if fear was kept it but its recharge was increased. Or if it was just prioritized less via Wolf AI 😄

Looks like it. Containment means Controllers do additional damage to targets which are already Held, Immobilized, Slept, Disoriented, or Terrorized.

Cute gifs aside...... I have plenty of control and very little damage on my dark to dark to use containment on anyway. That wolf is contributing very little, if any at all, extra damage via 'it feared something not already under one of my many control powers and now I'm getting extra containment I would not normally get". So yeah. I would. You do you, as I always say, but given the option, I would take a triple cooldown on the fear how in a heart beat. If somehow extra controls significantly increased containment's effectiveness even further, I might care for moar control/fear. Honestly, a good chunk of my damage comes from Possess. So the wolf fearing the wrong enemy can actually lower my overall DPS. No thanks. I'm very careful when I use immobolize vs something like fear because of that fact.

Ha...I'm not a fan of messing with files...but I do love the mod manager (as it works so well). There's ONE mod I found that specifically says it works to change all dark sounds, including wolf, so i'll try that. Though, honestly, if a mod is needed to address a complaint by a lot of players running that set, it might be a great idea for a suggestion, which is why I posted that here. I will point out that I suggest to cut its number of activations (increase its reacharge). I could have just asked to mute it in my suggestion. The reason for this is that, even if muted, it really looks dumb that my wolf is doing the 'howl' every 10 seconds (it happens sooooo often) and I can't help but think "Stop howling and attack!!!" Honestly, if the recharges on that was 3x longer, and therefore he attacked more, I would be very happy. If someone told me "But if you do that, his DPS is just WAY too high and it blows all other controller pets away!" then I would suggest "Please move forward with my suggestion and lower the DPS of wolf's attacks to balance it out." Personally, my Dark controll has so much control, I don't need the wolf adding a bit more fear every 10 secs anyway. It's a waste. But even if the sound didn't get on my nerves, the fact he's arching his back howling so often is definitely ruining a bit of the power fantasy. I play quite a few pet classes, including beast MM...I love my doggos.... but this wolf has a few issues with it that just make it a lot less fun in combat than it should actually be IMHO. The repetative sound is the top of the list through (and the easiest to solve, probably).

Salutations. I never implied it was a bug. I'm sure its working exactly as intended. I want it to go away. Or Cut it down. Or something. Triple its recharge time (I swear it feels more than every 10 seconnds). Add in growls instead. I don't care if it lowers some overall effectiveness somewhere (or, better yet, balances out)...but just make it stop! ROFL I was streaming this at the time, and it seems I'm not the only one who finds the 'intended cry to wolven friends' to be grating. Some of our old timers in the SG immediately replied, "That's why I don't choose Dark controllers!" So...it's my suggestion that maybe something be done to address its irritation factor. Balance wise, I love the pet overall 🙂

The Song of the Shadow: A Cautionary Tale of the Umbra Beast They told me the path of a Dark/Dark Controller was one of patience. I knew what I was signing up for—slow, methodical battles where I’d weave shadows to hold my foes while slowly chipping away at their resolve. Controllers aren't exactly known for their blistering damage, so I spent weeks in the trenches of Paragon City, soloing through the slog and occasionally teaming up for a duo or trio. It was excruciatingly slow. I used every SMARTweapon, every temporary power, and every tactical scrap I could find to keep the momentum going. But there was a light at the end of the dark tunnel: Level 26. The level I would finally summon my loyal companion, the Umbra Beast. When the moment finally arrived, I was in awe. The artwork on the wolf is stunning—a shifting, ethereal predator made of pure midnight. I couldn't wait to see it tear through the Council and Circle of Thorns alike. Then, the fight started. My excitement evaporated, replaced by a cold, rising horror. It started with a howl. Awoooo! "Cool," I thought, "very thematic." Ten seconds later: Awoooo! Fifteen seconds later: Awoooo! Because I’m a Controller, my fights aren't exactly short. Each encounter became a relentless symphony of shadow-yapping. I swear, the beast would do twice the DPS if it would just stop singing the song of its people and actually bite something! By the hundredth howl in a single mission, the noise wasn't just irritating—it was soul-crushing. At this point, I’d make a deal with a Circle Mage: take the howl away. I don't care if you have to lower its base damage to compensate for the "lost animation time." Just give me the gift of silence so I can enjoy my dark shadows in peace. If you see a Dark Controller standing in the middle of a mission looking haunted, it’s not because of the enemies—it’s because the wolf just started its next verse. 😄 Yes...my suggestion is to cut the howing by 3/4 at least, and decrease the DPS if necessary to balance overall DPS please 🙂

I saw that. Just bumping to keep it fresh on the list 🙂

I want to bump this as I found out through personal experience about this issue and it did cause a lot of frustration. I do appreciate the devs hard work though...just keeping this up on the list 🙂 +0 it is in the meantime!!! 😄

Salutations. I’ve been running my Dominator again after being away from the game for a little over a year and I’ve noticed a consistent behavior change that I don’t remember from before. When I use a control power on an enemy, the effect does not seem to take hold immediately. There is a noticeable delay of a few the target is still able to act, often long enough to retaliate and land an attack before the control actually applies. This happens often enough, so I asked others and another player replicated the issue on his end. After logging into different characters, it seems sparadic with certain holds/confusions/etc., but once its on your character (at least for that session), it seems to persist. Logging out and back in seem to help by reducing the window they have control, but the issue was still on my character afterwards. Yet other ATs with the same power had no issue at all.

In some more tests, I see it happen to various degrees on some characters, not others, lending me to believe it might be a bug. I'll post the info there 🙂

So, I had it happen quite a bit on my Psychic Stalker using Boggle. However, to your point, I tried a controller and it doesn't happen. Also, my psychic dominator doesn't seem to have an issue either. It may be a sparadic type of bug.

Salutations. I’ve been running my Dominator again after being away from the game for a little over a year and I’ve noticed a consistent behavior change that I don’t remember from before. When I use a control power on an enemy, the effect does not seem to take hold immediately. There is a noticeable delay of a second or two where the target is still able to act, often long enough to retaliate and land an attack before the control actually applies. This happens often enough that it feels systemic rather than situational. I’m trying to determine whether this was introduced in a patch sometime over the last year and a half, and if so, what the design reason was behind it, because it significantly changes how Dominator control feels in close-range or reactive situations.

Good to know!! Thank you!!!

This is very frustrating...Duo'ing with another friend....-1 settings, and so many yellows, oranges and reds. We're dying left and right (level 20s with Enhancments of course).

Oh yeah... totally. I expect that with Story Arcs, but less so on Police/Alignment missions. And it was everrrry mission, which is why it was starting to bother me. So odd!!

' So here is a five pack of +1s...again, seems off for -1 settings for two people.

Another group... 4 minions, 1 LT at our level in a group...makes sense if it was +0, but not -1 (for 2people)

It's happening on Police missions.... If we're at -1...why are minions the same level or +1s ?

Salutations. My friend and I have been playing City of Heroes Homecoming together and ran into a persistent difficulty issue that became increasingly frustrating. While running alignment missions as a duo, we repeatedly encountered minions that were one to two levels above us, which meant lieutenants and bosses were significantly more durable and time-consuming to defeat, resulting in very slow progression. As group leader, I lowered the difficulty incrementally from mission to mission, yet it appeared to have little to no effect, and I was making sure to be the first one in. By the end, the settings were at minus one with one player selected, fully aware that the game would still scale to two players, but minions were still consistently yellow and orange to us, including basic minions, indicating they were above our level. Afterward, I ran a police radio mission solo, and the enemies were finally at my level, which was an improvement, but this raised a consistency concern. With difficulty set to minus one, the expectation was that enemies would spawn one level below my character, particularly since police radio missions are scaled to player level by default. Instead, they appeared equal level rather than reduced, suggesting either difficulty modifiers are not applying as expected or there is a disconnect between team scaling, mission scaling, and radio mission behavior. What do you guys think?

Ah .. yeah...I find it frustrating as heck...I spend a lot of time making videos and training new people out of bad information like that 😄

Yeah, they are a niche thing. I'm a mainly solo player that does keep an eye on Merit rewards. Ouro is my main form of entertainment there 😄 I usually do alignment missinos in between story arcs as a palette cleanser and/or when I just want to run a quick mission or two (the way a lot of people use radios). Since I know they essentially pay 3.5 merits (600k worth) per mission on the average (since the morality mission awards 40 after you do 10 alignments), I find that's on part with Ouro. There are a number of 1-2 door ouros that fit the same niche of something quick that pays a few merits, but they get repeative REAL quick.

Indeed. There's a small segment of players who are into merit speed running and the such, but its not a huge thing, and its not a huge motivator for player behavior IMHO. Sure, if someone is on the fence about an activity, waving merits in front of their face MIGHT push them over. But its so opaque that players don't see it as INF (even though they really are in a way). So, when I advertise Ouros, I literally say "Running XYZ in Ouro with reward of 12 merits worth about 2 mil INF!"

I hate to tell ya, but a lot of people don't even pay much attention, if any, to the lore. They don't find the writing that compelling and/or they just don't like to read. Trying merit rewards to those activities that have story in there doesn't push them to read it more or anything like that. If the story is great, it becomes its own reward anyway (ask anyone who has played a really good RPG or visual novel). And even if it did, I personally am not a fan of saying on one hand 'people play the way you want' and then saying 'but we'll only reward you with even the smallest amount of significant currency unless you play it the way we want or engage with the content we want you to." Radios / Banks may have meant to be filler content by the devs. I do not claim to know their intentions, nor do I care all that much. Alignment missions are probably, in a way, the same thing...something you do once in a while to switch alignments. Similar to Radio/bank, it has a number of highly rando factors in it and eventually ends in a fancier mission. Both of these are things people often do...though I believe they do groups of the bank missions more than the alignment missions, lol. Anyway, alignment gives forty merit rewards for something that takes people like two hours tops to do (without rushing..a lot less with stealth). Its 10+1 door. The suggestions here throw a full run of 5 doors with 5 sidemission at 10 merits. A lot less...but that's fine as radios tend to be easier overall. You'd have to run that four times to equal one morality mission run. I personally think that's a good compromise. You don't. That's cool. We'll agree to disagree and move on 🙂

I won't go through all of your points because its not only getting off track from the core dicussion on whether or not adding a few merits is a good idea or whatnot...but I can't make heads or tails of some of your points through your overuse of 'sarcasm.' Regardless, as far as this 'assumption' is...how do I put this. ...this is a silly argument you're making. I never said "All old timers have 1.4 billion." So you're basically strawmanning me at this point... I usually just walk from conversations because its clear the other party has no interest in having a fruitful, honest discussion. I said "To Old Timers with 1.4 billion on their toons, [merit rewards] are chump change." Obviously, if you're an 'old timer with zero billion' or whatnot, you would not be the party I'm talking about here, eh? I do talk to a lot of long timers, and they do have various amounts of wealth and personal value they put on Merits. I would say the majority, or even the vast majority that I've spoken with do not put a lot of value on merits, however. This is usually due to the fact that if/when they need money, they will usually farm in AE for it, where the make a LOT more per hour than any merit farm would ever gain them. Merits never gets them to play a mode they don't like. If they need money, they'll farm! There are a few old timers that I have met that do, in fact, enjoy collecting merit rewards for whatever reason (including slow, but steady wealth progression)....but that is the minority of those I've run with. It's also very interesting to find old timers who barely know what ouro is, or have a huge knowledge gap of how it works, or some of its details, because, quite frankly, they'd rather do nearly anything else... TFs, Radios, DFB or whatnot. With that said, I have never said, nor implied, "100% of 'old timers' have 1.4 billion" or "100% of old timers hate ouro" or "100% of old timers only show new players TFs and Radios while training". WHat I have said is that it does seem to happen quite often based not only on me seeing it happen (and usually getting into a fiesty convo with said old timer), but also in talking with plenty of new players who are getting up there in levels, maybe have a few toons, finding out they can't afford anything, and questioning them on what they've been doing to level their characters and why. Is it scientific? Of course not. And if this was the ONLY reason I had, it may not be worth bringing up as a suggestion (though I think anyone should be able to suggest anything they believe is healthy for the game, regardless of the lack of research....brainstorming invites all ideas). But, as I have also said, I feel it's a missed opportunity, and it feels incongruent with the rest of the game design. Ultimately, while some of you may not agree, I believe all players should be able to enjoy the game however they want- and if there's structured content, like this, and people enjoy it, they should be able to earn some of the substantial currency rewards the game offers if that's what other similar activities does. In GW2, activities like this are awarded with crafting materials and/or silver/gold. In WoW, nearly every activity offers small coin and a piece of gear that's usually a small step up in a slot. In this game, it's merit rewards and eventually incarnate salvage for higher end stuff. I'm not suggesting we add in the higher tier rewards, or PILES of merits. I'm suggesting that a small, but signficant reward for clearing either side quests, contact / brooker missions with the bank mission, or both, warrents a small, yet substantial reward (100 INF is not 'substantial' in a game where SOs costs 30k+ and IOs go for 100k-5m, but 1 merit reward, which sells for 150k, is).

The conversation isn't about the Ouro mechanics speifically, and none of those details really adds or detracts from the argument I'm making. With that being said, I do love ouros and do lots of new player videos to encourage and show them to use Story Arcs, both in and out of Ouro, for leveling and merits. Getting to Ouro is pretty darn easy. Just say "Someone please open an ouro portal' in Atlas park. 🙂 Once you step through it, they're set. As you point out, you cannot do much there until 15...so my videos address a number of ways to do that, primarily story arcs you can do.. Sure. At 15, I level all of my characters doing lower level arcs. I'm not sure what you mean by 'poor players to do' or anything like that. Doing lower level arcs awards as much as anything else does. You get good xp and merits from them. And since you use your powers 5 levels above the level of the mission/exemplar, you usually have full access to all your current powers. My point in the original argument is, if that person joins a group with vets, they will often show them newspaper/ radio missions and how easy those are to do. A lot of people, even if they've seen some story arcs, really don't care all that much about the 'stellar story' of COH (I know its hard to believe), and they might have cmpletely missed that the reward merits they got from doing them are really valuable. They may miss in doing radio missions that there are no merit rewards to those activities. What they do see clearly is they level just as fast, if not faster, in those group radio missions. I noticed this pretty quickly when I was relearning the game because I'm an accountant. My eye is always on the money 😄 And because of someone else's video, I learned about the value of Merit Rewards to new player financial progression early on. To old timers with 1.4 billion on their toons, its chump change. To a new player, its their first full set of IOs.