Bill Z Bubba

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2019/11/19/rising-costs-dwindling-recruit-numbers-increasing-demands-may-bring-back-the-draft/ https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/military-recruiting-struggles-enlistment-stations-close-69973543 /ex-army.

I was going to go with "well, maybe they wouldn't be in the crosshairs if the cops would quit firing indiscriminately into large crowds while showing off how proud they are of their Punisher pins and car stickers."

Just tanked Recluse on an MLTF with my SR/Claws BZB. Hadn't tried before now. Was not an issue. 🙂

I'm pretty sure this particular issue is a bit more widespread than just on this forum.

That's the second personal insult from you in this thread, but I'm the one lacking in maturity? Your belief is grounded in formulae and equations that have been altered, broken, skewed, changed without documentation, change with documentation, reworked, etc, etc. Yup, you sound like a zealot of any other flavor.

Because we're in a thread about Titan Weapons being altered and some were stating that its performance outside of SOs should not be considered since "the game is balanced around SOs," a falsehood that you obviously seem hellbent on continuing. Oh really? So was it balanced around SOs when we 6slotted damage into an attack before ED or was it balanced around SOs after ED essentially capped us at 3? Or was it balanced around SOs when they became completely meaningless again with the introduction of incarnate powers functioning in the same content that is supposedly balanced around SOs? One of those is a lie since it couldn't have been balanced around SOs in all the cases. And if either period was not actually balanced around SOs it brings into question the validity of the claim. One's belief regarding any given topic doesn't mean much to the rest of us when said belief doesn't appear to be grounded in reality. "Balanced around SOs" may have been a GOAL but it was NEVER a reality. No, just you being smarmy. Generally speaking, it is true that I now power level to 32 and thus slot at that point. I was curious, since that's allowed, to see how this particular character worked at lower levels and thus couldn't slot lvl 35 IOs. It's still true that I don't slot SOs at any point.

You do understand that not a single bit of this matters when discussing whether a given powerset is completely outside the norm *even at SO levels of enhancement, right?* And that's my point. As for the "fixed reference value provided by SOs," the game is also supposedly balanced around +0/x1 difficulty, which is absurd even if just using SOs. No, this game is not balanced around SOs. It's an old and ridiculous belief that was barely true before the inventions system was added. Why do I know this? Because the game has never been properly balanced in any case from any measure of analysis. Edit: Except that it's fun as hell, of course. While I'm editing, I'd also love to read citations showing that the actual game engine itself is geared around powers with SO lvls of enhancement, whatever the hell that actually means, and where the engine had to be drastically recoded across the board when ED was slapped on to it.

And we both know neither of us have those quotes. They haven't been made. This is not NCSoft's City of Heroes. It's not Paragon's City of Heroes. It's not even Leandro's hidden for 6 years and tweaked to his liking CoH. This is Homecoming's. Old rules need not apply and in this case, absolutely shouldn't. Balance should include the entire spectrum of the game and what it has to offer. It shouldn't ignore a vast portion of content simply because of some ancient and arbitrary statement.

Have the current devs stated so? I don't recall that post. Anything the old devs had to say on the topic became null and void as soon as the SSPS was set up by Leandro.

You win for most correct answer.

O.o Someone needs to up their meds cuz the voices are gettin a wee bit violent.

I don't slot SOs. Or DOs. Or TOs. At 32 I get lvl 35 basic IOs or start slotting sets. How can the game still be considered "balanced" around something that isn't used? Even if you go with the argument that most are actually playing the first 32 levels and not doing the two PL me fast lowbie trials how can we ignore the fact that many that ARE playing that content are leaning on lowbie sets? Or P2W buffs? The game needs to be balanced around how it's actually played, not how we once played or wish it was played. We now have many posters stating that an AT's lack of mez protection is meaningless because it's easy to stay loaded up with the defensive amplifier. I'm logged on to a nature/water defender right now with it and she has 19 set IOs slotted... at lvl 23. The rest are lvl 25 basic IOs. "The game is balanced around SOs" was something people discussed back when we had the OLD difficulty settings. It was stated when we discussed HO builds. It's no longer a belief that has relevance.

No dual blades, either. It has something to do with the dual-wield animations but I don't recall the specifics. It can't be because the leaps would look silly since you can do granite/ma and eagle's claws to the head with rooted feet.

Deleted demon/kin. AT just ain't for me. Like stalkers. No biggee. Love what ya love and all that.

While I would never deny that scrapperlock is real regardless of what AT I'm on at any given moment, this statement is false. My demon/kin's secondary is my primary focus because it has to be so that my demons remain buffed and healed and semi-useful.

Nah. I don't keep what I don't play. I'm not a fan of clutter.

Another option to consider would be to go FU/Eviscerate/Slash/Repeat using a damres debuff proc in both evisc and slash. Fury of the Gladiator for evisc, Achilles' Heel for Slash. That's what my claws/bio runs and if I could tolerate evisc's animation I'd probably go that way on the 3 Bills. The fun part of this chain is that it loads up evisc's already higher than normal base critical chance when using the +crit chance proc in FU.

This is how I judge my characters. If they can't do this, then they aren't good enough. They might be fun, they might be relegated to "team only," I might still like and play them for a variety of other reasons but they will remain not good enough for normal play. Normal play is max diff against everything. Edit: Forgot to mention that this is as true for my claws/sr scrapper main as it is for my claws/sr brute or sr/claws tank. Always a good rule but at that point we're not soloing so thinking of the welfare of others is always a good thing. Although staying at max diff with fair warning also works. 🙂

Kinda surprised that no one really spoke about Bio apart from a slight side mention. I've got 50s of fire/bio, fire/sr and fire/nin and by far, the added damage from Bio makes that one shine above the others. Being unkillable due to all the absorption is a nice bonus.

If that's all there is to it, fine. Go to Dark Astoria, run repeatable missions from Ephram at max diff, compare your gains on a maxed out Sent vs a maxed out Blaster. I already know the outcome.

Sentinels are not blasters. They have mez protection. They have armor. Sentinels come into the mix with built in damres reduction which can not only be stacked with multiple sentinels but be stacked on any damres debuffs you can slot in your build. And again, a non-faceplated sent is going to out-dps the blaster who spends their time licking dirt.

There is no argument. There is no impasse. Anyone that states range doesn't reduce incoming damage and thus the likelihood of faceplanting is delusional or lying. I mean WTF.... go sit in melee on the 3rd mish of the ITF in the spawn of nothing but EB monsters and then hover above them blasting away and come back and tell me that being in melee doesn't increase incoming damage. Seriously. WTF.

Pretty sure they're the same caps. And coupled with being ranged instead of melee, they're actually vastly more durable. Just logged mine on and ate an orange. Yes, damres cap is 75% just like scrappers. Defense cap is 175%. Unsure if that's the same on scrappers.

Agreed. As safety goes up, damage should go down. That's why my scrapper does better damage than my brute which does better damage than my tank. All Claws and SR so it's a true comparison.

Nope. Didn't forget them. But this is a sentinel thread. VEATs have their own ridiculous design issues.