Omega-202

@InvaderStych, yes that is definitely a huge factor. I cannot overstate how disgusting a damage capped, 4 proc @ 90% fire rate Ground Zero with a 22.5ft radius, 30 target cap and 23 second recharge is. Or a 30 ft, 5 proc @ 90% fire rate Radiation Therapy. And those are Tank PRIMARY powers that make my poor Sentinel cry in a corner with his sad nuke. AoEs that large probably shouldn't be capable of having 90% proc rates while also having such low recharges.

The area size is one part of it. The other half is the absolute lack of runners and the easy clumping. I ran back to back S/L AE farms and PI Council and CoT radios last night just to see if I was losing my mind. I ran my fully tricked out AoE focused Elec Stalker vs my new AoE focused Tank. The assumption was that the Stalker would clear faster due to the higher damage, but in all three tests, the Tanker was clearing faster, which I had a feeling it would. The biggest difference was AoE efficiency. Stalker hit harder but the enemies wouldn't clump and my AoEs weren't capping out and bosses bolted halfway through a fight. I think this might merit further review. There's the weird intangible factor from the enemy AI that doesn't really show up when you look at Tanks vs other ATs that I think contributes to the weird balance situation.

Honestly, I think the offense buffs may have been a bit much, but I'm not complaining. Combining the damage scalar buff with the AoE radius/cone widening and the fact that enemies hug Tanks so tight has led to certain builds turning into absolute AoE mulchers. Being so inherently bulky without requiring a lot of investment means you can really focus on damage dealing and proc based frankenslotting while still functioning as a Tank for a team. My Rad/Dark/Soul is essentially unkillable and can nuke lvl 54 spawns down to bosses in 3 attacks (and can hit 30 enemies with procced out Ground Zero if you can drag two spawns together!).

1) It's objectively faster. TP to SG base, unslot with unslotters at base merit vendor, put in table, log out, log back in on new 50. Takes less than 5 minutes. 2) You're not building optimally then. To your later point, if you're not rocking gamblers and the defensive uniques, then we're playing different games. Regarding the Miracle, again you're showing your lack of knowledge because Panacea is objectively more bang for your buck and Miracle is a tertiary unique when it comes to efficient recovery. 3) What game are you playing where you are going to drop what you are doing and need to go grab a niche powerset that you haven't played in a year to join an ad hoc master of TF? Talk about a contrived nonsense scenario. If you have so many 50s, as do I, then just grab one of the other ones that's not stripped down. This is so ridiculous. If you want to believe that everyone would be making museums of "in case of emergency, break glass to access your 1.4 billion inf, crappily built 50" than you do you. I don't think that would happen on any massive scale.

Then why not strip them for parts instead of buying fresh IOs for the next 50? Seems silly to mothball kitted out characters. I often strip down old completely unused 50s, if only for convenience. 5 gamblers, the full suite of defensive uniques, a shifter or two, and 3 or 4 sets of purps can be used on most builds. Saves time having to shop for parts. Sorry, the concept of keeping a tricked out 50 as is, unused, like some weird collectible is a totally alien concept to me.

And here is the disconnect. This is where our base assumptions are incompatible and we're coming down on opposite sides. Why is that the assumption? Why do you think that people are going to just collect action figures of kitted out 50s and never play them? If that's the case, those people should just play on Brainstorm. Why have characters and not play them? That's insane to me. If that's your base assumption, no further conversation needed. I disagree but I'm not going to convince you.

Which pools do I think have value on VEATs? ...Speed, Fighting and patron pools. Just my honest answer. Hasten is hasten. All 4 VEAT varieties have a solid number of long recharge powers that appreciate it, maybe except NWs. VEATs get great value out of Tough, and Soliders at least get great value out of Weave. For some reason, S/L res is a bit of a hole for Crabs and Tough fills it well. Widows don't get a lot of resist, so Tough helps supplement their defense. I wouldn't discount PPPs on a Fortunata. Gloom is ridiculous DPA and beats out most of the Fort's native attacks. Mu and Soul also give you more AoE that have great DPA compared to Psi nado. That said, Fold Space is amazing. Probably the best aggro management power available in the game in my experience. 100ft radius so you end up grabbing a lot of attention and can stop runners easily.

In this hypothetical, probably. Said farming would generate lots of inf AND drops, the inf would drain from the economy to fund the 50 token and the drops would be put on the market. IE, more deflationary pressure to counter any inflationary increased demand for rare IOs.

1) And that player who then hits 50 is doing what? Deleting all drops from that day forward? No, they are selling those drops to fund the next character. So instead of generating meager and inefficient drops as a lowbie leveling, they're cranking out high levels of productivity to dump on the market. Front loaded production vs back loaded production. Still same amount of drops generated, or likely more. 2) As mentioned, you can limit the number of flooded 50s via a cost to the insta-50 coin. You don't just end up with millions of new 50s if you have to pay 500 mil for the token. Solvable issue with just a modicum of effort. You are so far off base its worrisome.

I am not saying its a good idea, but this logic is not wholly sound. 1. Not generating inf - (a) this is inherently deflationary (b) inf generation by 1-49s is a drop in the ocean compared to 50s. 2. Not generating salvage - salvage is completely fungible. A lvl 50 spirit thorn and a lvl25 clockwork winder are indistinguishable on the market. This is a literal non factor. And 1-49 salvage generation is again a drop in the ocean to what lvl 50s are cranking out. 3. Not generating recipes - again, fungible. Lvl 50 IOs sold on the market can be bought at any level that IO can exist at. If the concern is that you end up with fewer 10-30 recipes, then just buy some 20-50 recipes at lvl 20 on the market and convert them or run more Positrons. Exemped 50s get lower level recipe drops, and I imagine they probably also out pace the supply of natural lowbies. 4. Zero SOs - what? who is buying or selling SOs on the market these days? Is this actually a thing? 5. Increased high value IO demand - yes, probably, but all that's doing is accelerating the demand because you've POSSIBLY lowered the barrier to entry....and about that... 6. Cost of a lvl 50 token - opportunity for a giant inf sink to fight any inflationary trends and to act as a stand in barrier to the leveling process, fighting any inflated demand from the above point. Most of your points are nonsense or deflationary. The only possible inflationary factor is the increased demand, which can be countered with a proper price point on the lvl 50 token. I agree its a bad idea, but please use some sound reasoning.

Nope, you're not missing anything that's all correct. It's always been more efficient to sell converters and buy what you want, with Purps being close to the break even point. FYI, the reason for the high converter value is because they are a profit generating engine via converting garbage uncommon IOs to rare IOs and less valuable rare IOs to more desireable rare IOs. 40k in crafting materials and 3 converters (210k, about 250k in total) get you a random rare IO that can sell for 500k-5 mil.

...Those things are all still true. Fly and Mystic Flight - capped at 88 mph (33% uptime on Afterburner to get you up to 102 mph) Jump and Mighty Leap - capped at 101 mph (takeoff gets you to 110 mph for 30s, low uptime) SS and Speed of Sound - capped at 120 mph + bonus vertical movement options. Flight is still slowest, Speed is still faster, Jump in the middle, TP is fastest but more awkward to use. Where did we lose the tradeoffs?

IOs are icing on the cake for TP powers if you have the slots to spare. A single 50+5 Range IO is more than enough. The big difference maker is setting up key binds. I have TP/Translocation bound to thumb button 3 on my mouse, so i can TP anywhere on screen with one click. For characters with Mystic Flight, I have MB3 bound to toggle MF on and then Translocate, so a double click can go from standing to teleport essentially immediately. I also have MB4, a second thumb button, set to some sort of "TP to target" that utilizes TP, or more preferably Combat TP if I have that, to TP directly to my target. Indespensible on melee characters. No more chasing, no more walking in general. Once you get the hang of it, it's game changing movement control.

Teleport is still the fastest travel power, hands down. Nothing comes close, so I don't think it needs any work. Not to mention the insane utility for escaping rough spots. One click and you're well outside any enemies range. Translocation (as part of MF) is also great, even if you can't enhance the range on it, I'm pretty sure it's still the second fastest option to pure TP.

It is a placebo. The minus threat suppresses along with the stealth effect upon attacking/being attacked/clicking a glowie. See: https://cod.uberguy.net/html/power.html?power=pool.invisibility.stealth&at=blaster

Damage resistance acts as both of those. Like Hjarki was saying, Damage Resistance to Smashing will give you resistance to Damage Resistance debuffs to Smashing and Damage Debuffs to Smashing. To me, it's especially interesting how this interacts with AVs, especially ones with godmodes. Marauder and Bobcat when she hits Unstoppable are highly resistant to damage debuffs because they have huge damage resistances to their main offensive typing. I did some testing with Marauder with Darkest Night and Tar Patch a while ago, and the interactions are...interesting.

Read the g-d thread. Troo stipped the marked bare and showed that there are substantial standing positions to buy and sell at 10k/25k. Someone IS manipulating the market.

Don't like the facts, attack the messenger. Fine. I'm done, @TheZag is right. Whoever got us to this point got what they wanted and arguing about it is pointless. They'll get bored and things will bottom out again in a month or so. Glad at least we got proof that its happening, sad some don't want to believe it. Thanks to Troo for sacrifing inf and time to prove it.

So, as you rightfully point out, the marginal profits that this admited manipulator would be making is minimal. "Nickels for pennies". Then if not profit motive, why else would they do this? The next most likely options are that they're jerks/trolls or they see themselves as the pettiest version of the Fed in existence. So they're either trolling or a moron with some sort of powertrip. Either way, the thread title fits. They exist, they are manipulating and they are an idiot.

So you admit its happening? That's a huge flip from a few posts up. Eat crow and just walk away instead of moving the goalposts. How in the world can we prove motivation?

@Troo just showed that theres a 10k/25k back stop set up by buying out and then relisting the whole float.... What more evidence can you want? Seriously? The curtain just got yanked down and you're still not seeing it Edit: and again, its not about the money. Its about people like you doing everything you can to try and rationalize and explain around what is pretty apparent.

SCRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAKKK sorry, that's just the sound of the goalposts being moved. I honestly don't care what this person's motivation is (actually I don't even care that they're doing it all that much). I do care that people in this thread are burying their heads in the sand and attacking someone for suggesting something fishy is going on. Now that @Troo has thrown enough money at the problem to show that someone has set up a "buy 10k, sell 25k" scheme, can people admit that they were wrong and that we have evidence that someone decided to play "aribter of the yellow salvage"? Probably not, but its a shame.

Even as a joke though, it shows that a single person can bottom out the whole standing market...and then some.

But again, why was uncommon salvage the only price that shot up? Why didnt anything else skyrocket? Why is there such a high standing bid for uncommon salvage but nothing comparable on any of the other pieces needed for the "craft yellow recipe>convert rare" process? Nobody is arguing that standard market participation moves the needle. That's so obvious as to be pedantic to point out. You're missing the point.

@Troo, thanks for showing what can be done on a whim. To those saying its still absurd to suspect that someone was/is playing games with the yellow market and that this is just natural supply and demand, I ask again: why is this only happening with yellow salvage? The argument that yellow salvage is some sort of bottle neck or tipping point between supply and demand still rings hollow to me. The main reason I don't buy the "organic price shift" narrative is because of what the main demand driver is for yellow salvage: crafting and converting yellow recipes. If the salvage market dried up so quickly, why are the go-to yellow recipes for craft>rare>convert still super cheap with low bid volume? ESPECIALLY in view of yellow recipes being non-fungible (outside of level) and all yellow salvage being completely interchangeable. Recipe drop supply is way lower than yellow salvage supply, so where is all the yellow salvage going? And if someone (or a lot of someones) are mass crafting, then why is the price of desireable rares steady? The supply should be up and the price should be down. As a goof, Troo showed that a rich player (...or honestly most vet players) could absolutely screw up the market easily if so inclined, so why are so many ridiculing the idea that a more dedicated troll could mess with it for a laugh? EDIT: Not to mention converters also holding steady. Are we to assume that organic marketeers crafting and converting enough to dry up the yellow salvage market had no effect on the converter price? How could that be?