Rumors

The only way I'd want a damage meter is if it could only be used to view personal information, not the numbers of anyone else in the team/league/super group/zone/whatever. Only the user's. It'd be great for figuring out which attack chain is the best for me to use without having to crunch all the numbers myself or beg the genius bruisers on the forum to do it for me. But as the "see everyone's damage contribution", nah, no thanks. I mean, they can be interesting for research and can lead to some funny moments, but the toxicity they bring isn't worth it. When they became a big deal in Aion and people started gear checking before letting you go to any content was when that game became extremely unfun.

I looked into it myself. Shriek's recharge begins around when the projectile leaves the character, not as soon as the debuff starts. However, the debuff timer does start as soon as the power is executed, although, AFAIK, it does not boost the damage of the same cast (unlike Scream, which will self-boost the damage of the second tick and beyond on the same cast). Shriek will self-stack, however. With Hasten + AM alone at level 33 I was briefly able to triple stack (like, 1 second tops). I checked the debuff stacking by using a Power Analyzer. Either way, I don't think Shriek > Shriek > Shriek will work because you have to finish the casting animation before the recharge starts. If memory serves right, back on Live, the highest DPS chain was Shriek > Scream > repeat, although this did require perma Hasten, perma-AM, and not exemplaying below your set bonuses. Either Shriek > Scream > Shriek (to refresh the debuff) > Shout or Shriek > Scream > Shout are the next highest. Don't recall which, I remember there being some issues with Scream causing Shriek's debuff to fall off before Shout, hence probably needing the second Shriek.

If you don't mind looking through an outdated guide, I wrote one on GameFAQs that was last updated for I19: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/536558-city-of-heroes/faqs/59807 It's a very general guide and not focused on any specific build, so it should still mostly be usable. Most of the regular powers haven't changed. The main one is that Dreadful Wail no longer crashes you, Presence, Medicine, and Fighting have all been altered, Sorcery has been added, there's way more Incarnate abilities, and travel powers are more accessible. There's also a number of new sets and stuff that were added that might be worth considering but didn't exist then, like ATOs. As for builds, Rad's pretty flexible and a good team build often works well soloing. Not the most efficient, but you don't have to have two builds if you don't want to. Figuring out your build though kinda depends on your goal. Like, are you maximizing team support and debuffs? Do you wanna do a lot of damage yourself while keeping everyone up? Do you wanna be a pseudo-Controller at the same time? Do you like crashing and situational powers? Also, I'd currently take Bopper's advice for only using Shriek with a grain of salt as the recharge does not start until the projectile leaves the character, rather than as soon as the power executes, so it's impossible to have a single power gapless chain. If memory serves right, Shriek > Scream > repeat was the highest DPS chain, although it requires perma Hasten + perma AM to maintain and flounders a bit when exemplaring due to loss of set bonuses.

Some (a lot) of the really serious Defender fans get this, but it's a head scratcher for a lot of other players. But, playing an Offender. "Are you trying to be a support or a DPS?" Yes. "Why not play a Corrupter?" Because I wanna do a better job keeping your butt alive and fighting efficiently while I wreck the bad guys. I don't need silly mechanics like Scourge or higher base damage to wipe the floor with enemies. My debuffs are going down on the enemies to protect us and to make it easier for me destroy them all. I am going to output enough damage to make the Blaster go "wait wut da heck?" while protecting everyone else. "But things are going down too fast for you to get set-up." That just means it's time to crank up our notoriety, friend. Offending isn't being a "Blaster with a heal" or a "gimped Corrupter" or someone who "ignores their primary". It's a mindset. It's being a Defender who is using their full toolkit to support the team while ending the fight as fast as possible. Not all primaries work super well for it (Empathy Offender sounds pretty meh until you hit the 40s), sure. But yeah, while that Corrupter might bring more personal DPS, might, the Offender is bringing much more team DPS while still wrecking stuff on their own.

On extremely rare occasion you might get someone on Everlasting going up to you and trying to RP with you through Local or whatever, but this has happened to me like... twice? Both times when idling in Atlas Park waiting on a friend to roll a new alt. I imagine it'd probably happen a lot more in the "RP Hubs" like Pocket D though. Characters on Everlasting seem to have more... interesting bios more often. There's been a couple going into detail about their character's "rippling muscles" and other physical qualities and felt more like a character profile for a... different sort of community. Granted, these are pretty rare though, in my experience, and usually kind of funny to read.

-Actually reading the mission text. I end up running a lot of solo arcs so I can read what's going on instead of spam clicking through everything since people get impatient. -Setting content to challenging. Did it a lot on Live, but most everyone here seems to want their TFs set to +0 and that's it. Invincible (aka +2) pre-Incarnate ITFs were fun back in the day. -Vengeance. ...the power, not getting vengeance on people. No need for quotes, it's a real thing. Super rare for me, but if you run Sonic Resonance and make your big bubble a bright white, it'll give me a nasty headache every time, guaranteed, until it gets turned off, color changed, or I leave. No idea why since so very little else bothers my eyes.

That can be done easily. My plan is... Rad: Everything but Choking Cloud Sonic: Everything but Siren's, Screech, and Shockwave Speed: Hasten Leadership: Assault, Maneuvers, Vengeance. Teleportation: Recall Friend Dark Mastery: All except Dark Consumption Incarnate: Not really gotten much this far, but Spirit Core Paragon and Clarion are both under strong consideration. Most likely not Reactive Interface since plenty of -Resist as is. This leaves one power pick for a travel power of choice or other move you might want. I don't think the build will lend itself to any defensive softcapping on IOs if you try these picks, like 'em, and decide to IO it out, but I usually rely on Rad Infection for that purpose. You can, of course, also shuffle picks around, like replacing Soul Transfer with Dark Consumption, swapping a Leadership toggle for Tactics, dropping EM Pulse for something else. I'm actually considering dropping Howl since I only use it for debuffing and I'm usually too busy to hop all over the place to keep it stacked. But I've not decided what I'd take instead.

I have a question along these lines, how does this work in AoE powers? Especially long cooldown ones, like Rad Emission EMP Pulse or blaster nukes? Will it roll against all the mobs? Only roll up to the 1-2 or whatever per minute? Or will only one lucky victim get procced?

I heard there was a topic about Savage Melee over in the Brute forum talking about it underperforming. So, thought I'd swing by and share my experiences with the set. For reference, I play a Savage/Regen Scrapper, who's level 50, moderately expensive IO build (mostly no purples, PvPs, ATOs, etc. Mostly), and has some Incarnate powers. First off, I'll say the set does feel unfinished. Both visual/audio (mainly on later powers) and a bit mechanically. Regardless, I had a blast with him the whole ride and still do. Low levels I did feel kind of vulnerable between no CC and low level Regen being... low level Regen. However, endurance for me was ridiculous. Like... I could pretend the blue bar didn't exist until about the 20s. The recharge on the set allows for a complete attack chain by filling with Shred. (Savage > Maim > Savage > Vicious > Savage > Shred > repeat if memory serves right.) Consuming my stacks and going into Exhausted was something to consider carefully, not something you'd expect from a set called Savage Melee. Fortunately, Blood Thirst as is recovers from that, meaning it gives you different options. You can, for example, build up stacks, burn them, and then get them back immediately to finish the fight. Or you can go normal Build Up route with it and use it as an opener to alpha strike a mob. Mid-level endurance was pretty manageable by just popping blues every few fights. Granted, I bought both Miracle + Recovery and Performance Shifter procs early on thanks to merits and a little market play. Later levels... the set feels like an AoE/ST hybrid. I'm playing at +2/3 (or basically +1/3 due to the level shift). I can easily do higher in both regards, but this is efficient enough for me right now. Without hitting Blood Thirst, I can throw a Fireball, chase it with Savage Leap (Leap's AoE is pretty big), and then Rending Flurry and that'll clean up most of the chaff. After that, it's find the biggest, baddest guy in the group and wreck him with my single target chain while tossing AoEs as they come back to finish the rest of 'em off. Most of the time, by the time the boss drops, everything else is dead too. With Hasten up, my strongest ST chain appears to be Vicious > Maiming > Savage, although I've not run the numbers. Savage > Maiming > Savage > Vicious > repeat feels better to use though. On powers, I dropped both Shred and Hemmorage when I did a level 33ish respec. The animation time on Shred is long and it's very narrow. It doesn't really do anything special enough to keep around, IMO. Rending and Leap, combined with an APP TAoE is plenty of AoE damage. Hemmorage feels like it'd probably be useful for AV/GM soloing and that sort of thing, but in a team setting it's hard to take full advantage of the DoT. The DoT IS juicy, but even then I have to wonder if going into Exhausted will cost you DPS long term either way due to the Recharge loss. Speaking of... at the point I'm at, Exhausted doesn't bother me much. The only times I want to avoid it is when I'm low on endurance from sapping or me just hitting about 6 groups in a row without stopping. I can still run my basic ST chain with very little interruption during the Exhausted crash, unless Hasten is down as well, in which case I can fill the pause with an AoE move. IOs pretty much negate the penalties from Exhausted, so you can just burn a full stack on Rending Fury, Blood Thirst, and do it again a few seconds later while AoE slaughtering stuff. Endurance will start to dip some if I go super ham on AoEs while Exhausted. But otherwise... I probably have too much Recovery slotted >.> ST damage does feel a little lower than some other sets. But, I've not run numbers, so it could be perception issues, and it also might be because of the sheer amount of Lethal resistance in the game. And it could also be that the numbers might just be smaller. Like... I could probably run my ST chain and a half in the time it takes, say, Broadsword to use 3-4 attacks. If you're curious, here's my build if you wanna see what I did. It's not an amazing build, I did cheat and take one Panacea set, and I probably have too many survival uniques/procs and not enough defense to justify having bothered with Weave. I imagine it has a lot of room for improvement, but it still works pretty well. Granted, I have no idea how this would translate to Stalkers, Brutes, or Tankers. The way I did things might not be possible or just suck on them so... grain of salt. Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.962 http://www.cohplanner.com/ Click this DataLink to open the build! Sawyer Teral WIP: Level 50 Natural Scrapper Primary Power Set: Savage Melee Secondary Power Set: Regeneration Power Pool: Speed Power Pool: Leaping Power Pool: Fighting Ancillary Pool: Blaze Mastery Hero Profile: Level 1: Maiming Slash -- CrsImp-Acc/Dmg(A), CrsImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(3), CrsImp-Dmg/Rchg(3), CrsImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(5), CrsImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(5) Level 1: Fast Healing -- Pnc-Heal/EndRedux(A), Pnc-Heal(7), Pnc-Heal/+End(15), Pnc-Heal/Rchg(17) Level 2: Savage Strike -- CrsImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(A), CrsImp-Acc/Dmg(7), CrsImp-Dmg/Rchg(9), CrsImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(9), CrsImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(11) Level 4: Reconstruction -- NmnCnv-EndRdx/Rchg(A), NmnCnv-Heal/Rchg(23), NmnCnv-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg(23), NmnCnv-Heal/EndRdx(25) Level 6: Quick Recovery -- EffAdp-EndMod(A), EffAdp-EndMod/Rchg(40), EffAdp-EndMod/EndRdx(40), EffAdp-EndMod/Acc(40) Level 8: Vicious Slash -- CrsImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(A), CrsImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(11), CrsImp-Acc/Dmg(13), CrsImp-Dmg/Rchg(13), CrsImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(15) Level 10: Dull Pain -- NmnCnv-Heal/EndRdx(A), NmnCnv-EndRdx/Rchg(27), NmnCnv-Heal/Rchg(27), NmnCnv-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg(29), NmnCnv-Heal(29) Level 12: Blood Thirst -- AdjTrg-Rchg(A), AdjTrg-ToHit/Rchg(42), AdjTrg-EndRdx/Rchg(42), AdjTrg-ToHit(50) Level 14: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(36) Level 16: Integration -- Mrc-Heal(A), Mrc-Rcvry+(17), Mrc-Heal/EndRdx(34), Mrc-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg(36) Level 18: Rending Flurry -- Obl-Dmg(A), Obl-Acc/Rchg(19), Obl-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(19), Obl-Dmg/Rchg(21), Obl-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(21) Level 20: Resilience -- UnbGrd-Max HP%(A), UnbGrd-ResDam(37), UnbGrd-ResDam/EndRdx(37), UnbGrd-Rchg/ResDam(37) Level 22: Combat Jumping -- LucoftheG-Rchg+(A), ShlWal-ResDam/Re TP(36), Ksm-ToHit+(43), Ksm-Def/EndRdx(46), Ksm-Def/Rchg(45) Level 24: Super Speed -- Clr-RunSpd(A) Level 26: Boxing -- Empty(A) Level 28: Instant Healing -- NmnCnv-Heal/EndRdx(A), NmnCnv-EndRdx/Rchg(31), NmnCnv-Heal/Rchg(31), NmnCnv-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg(31), NmnCnv-Heal(34) Level 30: Tough -- UnbGrd-ResDam(A), UnbGrd-ResDam/EndRdx(39), UnbGrd-ResDam/EndRdx/Rchg(39), UnbGrd-Rchg/ResDam(39) Level 32: Savage Leap -- Obl-Dmg(A), Obl-Acc/Rchg(33), Obl-Dmg/Rchg(33), Obl-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(33), Obl-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(34) Level 35: Weave -- LucoftheG-Rchg+(A), LucoftheG-Def(45), LucoftheG-Def/EndRdx(45) Level 38: Moment of Glory -- Rct-ResDam%(A), Rct-EndRdx/Rchg(43), Rct-Def/Rchg(43) Level 41: Ring of Fire -- Empty(A) Level 44: Fire Blast -- Dvs-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(A), Dvs-Acc/Dmg(46), Dvs-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(46), Dvs-Hold%(50) Level 47: Fire Ball -- PstBls-Acc/Dmg(A), PstBls-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(48), PstBls-Dmg/Rchg(48), PstBls-Dmg/EndRdx(48), PstBls-Dmg/Rng(50) Level 49: Confront -- Taunt-I(A) Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A) Level 1: Critical Hit Level 1: Prestige Power Dash -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Quick -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Rush -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Surge -- Empty(A) Level 1: Sprint -- UnbLea-Stlth(A) Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A) Level 4: Ninja Run Level 2: Swift -- Empty(A) Level 2: Health -- RgnTss-Regen+(A), Prv-Absorb%(25), NmnCnv-Regen/Rcvry+(42) Level 2: Hurdle -- Empty(A) Level 2: Stamina -- PrfShf-End%(A) Level 1: Blood Frenzy Level 0: Portal Jockey Level 0: Task Force Commander Level 0: The Atlas Medallion Level 0: Freedom Phalanx Reserve Level 50: Spiritual Core Paragon ------------

I personally think Trick Arrow works best on a Controller. Entangling Arrow can stack with the single target immobilize or allow them to skip it and also sets up Containment for extra damage. Ice Arrow can stack with the single target hold to instantly lock down any boss, for example, while glue arrow can negate the need to use mass-immobilizes. The debuffs are still very potent and Oil Slick will burn down everything still just as well and the 'Troller has the option of mass-immobilizing the crowd in it to keep them from fleeing. And, of course, EMP Arrow gives them a second mass hold to really lock down the everything if they need or want to. On live, one of my most memorable moments on my Grav/TA Controller was when we had a full team wipe from a combination of a second pull and an ambush. Except me. We had three whole groups attacking, including six bosses. Thanks to Trick Arrow and me speccing for excessive control, I kept everything locked down long enough for the team to go to the hospital, run across the zone, run across the mission map, and return to the fight. Pulling that off would not have been possible without TA and all of its hard and soft controls.

RNG for hitting/defense/etc. is fine, but can you provide examples of MMOs or just RPGs with hit chance caps lower than 100%? I've only played a few MMOs and much fewer to any extent to really know their mechanics, so my MMO experience is limited. But, of those, both Aion and Elder Scrolls Online both allow players and enemies to have 100% chance to hit if they have the accuracy for it. The only games I can think of off the top of my head with low-than-100% hit caps the new/modern Avernum trilogy (especially 2 with its 90% hit cap, bleeeegh), Gen I Pokemon (due to a programming error), and "I think" the original KoTOR since it used really-old-school D20 mechanics. Even hardcore RNG-heavy games like Mordheim and Xcom allow for 100% hit chance if you have the stats for it.

I mean, yeah, let's be honest, it's not a "big deal". Allowing players to hit 100% chance to hit is really a small QoL feature that'd remove some annoyances most of the time and the occasional big frustration. On the latter, have you ever got into a fight with an (Elite) Boss or AV, came down to the wire where it seemed like you were going to barely win. And then whiff the last attack because of the 5% chance to miss and your enemy's attack kill you? How did you react to that? Was it "Ahhh yeah! The world feels like such a richer and more realistic place now because I randomly missed and died!" Was it "Man these random chances to miss make this game more dynamic, exciting, and challenging!" Or was it "Bulls#!t! I had that fight! And now I have XP debt! I'm gonna come back and pop 10 purples and 10 reds and beat your @ss!" I'm gonna guess most of us has probably gone for the latter. A few probably would go "That's Xcom baby!" but, this isn't a RNG heavy game like that where you're making calculated moves based on displayed odds before you make them. In most cases, random misses when a player should have 100% chance to hit do nothing but draw out the fight for no real gain, since it's unlikely the miss is going to put the player in any more danger unless they're playing recklessly or too high of a difficulty to begin with. In most of the rest of the cases, it causes huge frustration and the player will feel cheated out of a victory from RNG. In incredibly rare cases it'll save a player's life when a mob rolls the 5% chance to miss, but considering the number of attacks flying at a player typically, there'll be a follow-up kill shot in half a second anyway. Besides, on the realistic argument, enemies can already have powers that make them more evasive if they are supposed to. Or make you less accurate. Additionally, is it really realistic that I can randomly miss Babbage or Lusca when I'm shooting from 10 feet away? Even the game acknowledges how ridiculous that is by having my shots go straight up or whatever!

One for me is simple: /bind b powexec_name Aim /bind n powexec_name Build Up Quick, rapid fire boosts without needing to go to your tray to hunt them. Both keys are easily thumb accessible if you use WASD controls, but far enough to avoid accidentally tapping. If you need to quickly hit certain skills as clutch moments... like say Regen... /bind q powexec_name Reconstruction /bind e powexec_Name Dull Pain Some risk of fat fingering, but makes it very quick to use those skills in intense situations, provided you don't use the default Q/E camera controls. Simply /cleartray

Unfortunately, the only build I have right now is my very WIP moderate-cost Rad/Sonic build. (Like, not even all slots placed WIP). I could try to copy it and put it together with SOs.

I was going to make this suggestion myself, albeit must less verbosely. It always annoyed me that you could be hardcapped for accuracy and tohit and the enemy hardcapped for -defense and you'll still randomly miss. It's not fun, especially when the RNG just decides to roll "hit miss hit miss hit miss" when you should have 100% chance to hit. I don't think the increase in lethality would be very noticed with how many attacks go flying in team settings anyway. It'd impact solo/duo/maybe trio more where randomly whiffing your big attack or arbitrarily missing two people in an AoE are more impactful and obvious. But really, the arbitrarily hit chance cap of 95% just isn't fun. But thankfully it's not like another game called Avernum 2: Crystal Souls where hit chance was hard capped at 90%. That was friggin' frustrating.

...any maybe Ouroboros. Incarnate powers are cool, are fun, and all that. But maybe sometimes, instead of cranking up to +4 for a challenge for an Incarnate team, I might want to relive the older days of +2 being a challenge and just run without the all the super crazy stuff. Heck, maybe we can even tie one or more badges to doing TFs/Trials with them disabled to lure in people even more to give it a shot? Yes, I know, I could advertise for an Incarnateless TF/Trial, but asking everyone to unslot everything's a little bit of a hassle. And it also doesn't stop people from doing stuff like sneaking a Judgement nuke onto a mob nobody's watching. So, on the challenge menu for starting a TF, let's just add another tick box to disabling them, like we can for temporary powers and the like! This option probably shouldn't be available for iTrials and iTFs for obvious reasons. Buuuuut.... if people are nuts enough to want to undertake that sort of challenge then... well... why not give them the choice?

The original reason for this was that the capes caused performance issues. It wasn't noticeable in small numbers, but lots of players/NPCs wearing them would cause lots of lag, such as on the 3rd ITF mission part people call "Lag Hill", the "Valley of Doom" or whatever other names. ...granted, if that was purely a client side issue, I'm not sure it'd be a problem in this era of modern hardware. So, would be all for it.

I played a Rad/Sonic long ago on Live, up until Alphas were added. I have one now as well, but it's only level 32. There's a number ways to build it depending on how you want to go, ranging from AV/GM soloing, pseudo-controller, Offender, pure support, PvP player killer, "healer", and more. I haven't say down with it in Mids and don't have my old build, so can't comment on your slotting. For Rad, I take everything except Choking Cloud. It can definitely have utility, but you kinda have to build around it to get the most out of it. -Fallout is pretty amazing. People will drop for various reasons no matter how hard you try to save them. There's just nothing you can do if the Blaster backpedals into an unaggroed group and gets instagibbed, for example. With your damage buffs, you can pretty much end a fight with Fallout. You just need teammates who are patient enough to wait a moment in the dirt for you to move them and boom them. -For your debuff toggles, if you're steamrolling, best to either use RI to pull more mobs (you can move during half the cast!) or only use EF. If you're moving that fast though, your team probably needs to up the difficulty. On RI, 45% will be effective softcap provided enemies don't resist the debuff, which they can do by simply outleveling you or being an AV. I recommend going higher than that if you can do so. I think I was around 60%ish? For Sonic attack, I took Shriek, Scream, Shout, Amplify, Howl, and Dreadful Wail. -My ST attack chain was Shriek, Scream, Shriek Shout to maximize the resistance debuffs -Howl I only used for resistance debuffing and didn't have much slotting if memory serves right. -KB to KD didn't exist at the time, so Shockwave was a little useless to me since it's hard to use without scattering your anchors. Especially now when your anchor might be dead. -Siren's Song is good for soloing, but your debuffs are safe enough usually if you keep everyone near you, as unintuitive as that is for a Defender. Sleep doesn't play well with teams unless everyone is purely single target focused. -Screech has the biggest resistance debuff on the set, but I didn't have room for it. -Amplify > Soul Drain > Dreadful Wail = :D:D:D:D:D:D I went Dark Mastery, like you did. Even using EM Pulse and old Dreadful Wail, endurance wasn't enough issue for me for Dark Consumption. I went Oppressive Gloom, Dark Embrace, Soul Drain, and Soul Transfer. The latter is good for when the fecal matter aggressively locates your fan. In a team wipe, you can Soul Transfer > Mutation > Vengeance > Fallout and, if the fight isn't over, you and your super buffed ally will easily defeat your debuffed and weakened foes. ...plus it's good when an AV decides he's bored of the tank and randomly one-shots you from full despite all the debuffs and defensive toggles. For power pools, I think I went Speed, Leadership, and Teleportation. Hasten and Recall are obvious, but Vengeance is a usually skipped power that has awesome synergy with Fallout. Use it first, plus Amplify and Soul Drain, and Fallout will make your Blaster wet their pants. Besides, if you're gonna use your dead friends, might as well get full use of them. Plus you can bring like... level 2 players to your level 54 mission, let them die, and power level them by using them as Fallout/Vengeance bait the whole mission (and they'll probably be more useful that way too.) I've had people tell me that doing that was the most fun they've had playing the game and actually complained about the level-up rez. For Incarnates, I've not touched this much for Rad/Sonic since my 50 was during Alpha days of Live. I remember Spiritual Radial being the best pick since you used just about everything there and the recharge was awesome for your long clicks. But, there's more Alphas since then so... could be wrong. If you want PvP build advice, I can try to offer that too since I had a PvP build as well. But mind, it'd be all pre-Incarnate advice.

Oh, and this too! I'm missing Statesman though. And I forget if Scirroco had one or not. Ghost Widow's base is sadly broken and she either bends like that or falls off.

True, but that's really no different than the leader setting the TF to +4 without telling everyone.

My cellphone's camera has really bad quality :(

I'm not sure what they'd change about Dark Blast without making it into a generic blast set though. I'm not against it, but I'd like for it to keep its different flavor since having red-headed step children definitely does add some variety and unique build angles. But I mean... hmm, lemme bullet point this for simplicity. Bear with me, I can't look up the in-game detailed info right now to compare numbers. -Replacing Umbral Torrent with Night Fall: From a pure numbers standpoint, this seems like a nerf as Umbral Torrent looks like it's already Nightfall (moderate cone) and Torrent (low damage knockback cone) combined. For those who hate knock back it would certainly be a buff though. -Replacing Tenebreous with Engulfing Darkness: From a pure damage standpoint this would be an upgrade, since a PBAoE would need more damage than a cone since it's more dangerous to use. But it feels like it takes a bit of flavor from the set. Letting it keep the immobilize would keep the flavor, but I seem some possible issues in trying to combined it with the cone from Umbral Torrent. I think such a power would be more at home in Darkness Manipulation, since PBAoEs usually tend to live in Blaster secondaries (T9 nukes and Electric Short Circuit being the only exceptions). -IMO, what I think Dark Blast might lack is a TAoE attack, like Fireball. I'm not 100% sure where you would put it though. I could maybe see replacing Umbral Torrent with it and changing it from knock back to (chance for) knock down to prevent scatter. It'd probably do less damage per use, but it'd be a lot easier to use and it'd play well with- Actually, hold that thought. Maybe a damage patch skill like Rain of Fire and Whirlpool? You could set it up with Tenebreous and Abyssal Gaze to ensure targets can't escape it and ensure it does more damage. I don't think such an attack pre-exists to just put in the spot, however. But a damage patch with -tohit that synergizes with Tenebreous to keep them in the area could be pretty cool.

INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INVENTION SALVAGE DROP INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INCARNATE THREAD BONDED RECIPE DROP VANGUARD MERIT INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INCARNATE THREAD BONDED VANGUARD MERIT INCARNATE THREAD BONDED VANGUARD MERIT INCARNATE THREAD BONDED INCARNATE THREAD BONDED VANGUARD MERIT VANGUARD MERIT VANGUARD MERIT VANGUARD MERIT VANGUARD MERIT VANGUARD MERIT VANGUARD MERIT INCARNATE THREAD BONDED I guess I never got bothered by this on live, or drop rates were just lower in general, save the MSR, so it didn't feel so spammy. But can we please, please, please have an option to suppress some/all of these center of screen notifications? I'll settle for suppressing them all and glancing at my inventory during down time between activities if that's the only option. But ideally, would love to be able to toggle them on and off individually and set them by rarity. So like, have it show Purple drops of recipes but not orange and below, for example. Being able to suppress inventory full messages is already there, so that existing code might have some use in what I'm asking for.

Easy solution: In Taskforce/Trial options, give the option for the leader to disable Incarnate powers at the start. Obviously, leave that out for iTFs and iTrials.

Abrasive or not, Pixie is a bit correct. Dark Blast is originally intended as a Defender blast set, If you look at the powers, they're more focused on their debuffing and utility rather than straight damage. Sonic Attack and Radiation Blast are in a similar boat, although Sonic Attack didn't need any proliferation. Meanwhile, although Defenders get it, Fire Blast is in the opposite boat in that it's mostly damage and almost no utility, making it not so good on a number Defender primaries, like Empathy or Forcefields. Also, looking at the Dark Blast powers on the wiki, it looks like they did add a good bit of damage to Blaster Dark Blast, between Aim, Umbral Torrent, Abyssal Gaze, and a stronger Life Drain. Unlike Defender Fire Blast, which got no added utility. :(