tidge

AFAIK: Global Recharge does not affect the "To Proc" chances. +Recharge is a proc itself (that contributes to Global Recharge) If there is a rule about slotting /Recharge into a power, it roughly translates as: Don't slot so much recharge in a power that the power's 'inherent' recharge drops below the proc rate. Some powers (like Blood Thirst above, if it is like other 'Build Up' powers) have such a long recharge time that I don't think it is possible (because of Enhancement Diversification) to ever get it below the proc rate. Some powers (typically T1 and T2) have such short recharge times that you accept the tradeoff if that is where you 'must' slot a proc for a set bonus. I typically run into this situation with ATOs.

A copy from one of my earlier posts, where my conclusion was that it was not likely market manipulation but the uncommon salvage was artificially low: The supply of cheap uncommon salvage could have dried up simply because AE farmers may have switched their INF-making tactics to use the AH instead. IIRC the common: uncommon : rare ratio was 22 : 5 : 1, which may imply that yellows have been bargain priced for a long time! My personal thought is that it would take a lot of effort (in buying them) or apathy (from not bothering to list them) to dry up the supply of commons, and rares are already in the ballpark of the seed price... so if the largest source of salvage (AE farmers) switched tactics I wouldn't be entirely surprised to see yellow salvage in the 50K - 100K range. My observations in the late-April-2020 market (not working niches, not really buying, but just crafting and selling drops) are: The price of "direct-from-merit" items has dropped. I bought many discounted enhancement boosters over the weekend for a new level 50. Converter prices remain low, even though I often see the last 5 price is occasionally 90K -100K each. I glanced at Catalysts and it looked like they hadn't moved much... I didn't get any bites at the price I wanted to pay. Defense sets like LotG seem quite depressed, while Reactive Defenses seems to have jumped. In some cases it looked like the relative value of the sets had flipped. I often 6-slot Reactive Defenses, so I'm not surprised at the jump but this isn't how the market had been pricing them. I think that the Defense sets balancing out is a sign more people are getting into the market. Healing set prices were quite depressed, even sets like Preventive Medicine (another good 6-piece set). Adjusted Targeting: Recharge saw a nice jump. Folks with Mind Link may have taken my advice and bought up the supply... Gaussian's Fire Control set prices were depressed. Generally, across the board the rare IO prices were at the lowest they had been for a long time. RNGsus was toying with me this past week: I ended up with many more PVP recipes than Purples (5:1) than I expected (3:1) so I sold PVPs and bought the last few Purples I needed: PVP prices seemed standard, but I don't venture into this market much except when I want to clean out the SG base or leverage the market to catalyze some for low-level toons. I did only a small amount of roulette and sold all of them above 10 MInf, which seems right. The Purple market looked normal (long term bids had filled low, BIN prices around 20 MInf) although there were some odd pockets that I exploited (but only to save Inf and to invest in a future build) For larffs: I also ventured into the Inspiration market to get another WW badge and it was the usual hilarity. Nothing to report except that it always brings a smile to my face.

Lord Recluse didn't have his 'towers of power' when facing Marcus Cole in that solo missions... although come to think of it in the last mission of "Who Will Die?" Lord Recluse doesn't seem all that Incarnate either. I agree that these missions don't need to be boosted just because full-kits of Incarnate players can finish them. As much fun as it would be to have the entire Grandville map descend towards the towers while the players are attacking the towers, we actually do want to have missions in the game that DON'T require full-kit Incarnates to complete, especially when the reward can be a synthetic HO.

I have Hot Feet (on my Fire/Psi/Psi) and at high levels I resent it because it make the mobs run. At low levels I think it is more useful, but I suppose it depends on your defense values. I have the snipe, and often use it for the runners who escape the holds. Bonfire can also take a +Recharge proc which should fire 100% for you. I see you have Hasten 3-slotted; I think that at level 47 you can get by with 2-slots of 50+4 recharge with only a slight decrease in recharge time (which may not be noticeable).

A historical point : 'mob' is IIRC historical shorthand (at least dating back to the 1990 MUDs) for 'mobile', which would be any enemy... as opposed to mob being a cluster of enemies.

I took a look at my lvl 50 Mastermind (Bots/Traps) which is a concept character but slotted as a sort of Tankermind (keep reading). On that toon I took Tough/Weave as well as Mace Mastery (6-slotted with Reactive Defenses). Force Field Generator is 3-slotted (for Defense, doing almost all of the work) and I have Maneuvers (lvl 24) acting as a mule for Shield Wall. Tough is an IO mule (5-slotted) and Weave only has 2 slots. My oddball-Tankermind approach: Rather than using the Presence pool for Provoke, after lvl 30 I have Photon Grenade, Pulse Rifle Burst and Mace Beam Volley slotted for Knockdown and -Res (the Bots have KB-KD as well) to keep enemies in place for the pet attacks. I spam the attacks to try to keep aggro. One of the fun things about Masterminds is that they have a lot of 'skippable powers' (primary attacks) so experimenting with different Power pools is wide open to them.

I will use the fighting pool to mule IOs if I don't have other power choices. I harbor a secret dirty desire that all characters could get an inherent power Toughness-lite (with a very small S/L resistance) that could be used to mule Resistance IOs. Defense already has too many mules IMO! That being written, I have several toons where I don't take the Fighting pool because it is unnecessary. For example: Fortunatas can already mule all the Resist IOs and can far exceed (positional) Defense soft caps without worrying about extra Defense from Weave. For Masterminds: if the desire is for a Tankermind, you probably want to consider how much extra defenses you can get from slotting of Tough & Weave. The pets themselves will act as a sink for distributed damage, so damage resistance (especially when it is only Smashing/Lethal) is deprioritized. Boosting your Defenses is much more important if you want to Tankermind.

I've taken to 6-slotting the Gaussian set in Build Up type clicky powers for a while now, at least on toons where the damage boost is regularly desired. With the natural power recharge time on the order of 90 seconds, my high Global Recharge builds have the power ready just over every 20 seconds: The Boost lasts half of that time and the Build-Up proc is good for the first half of that. The recharge from the Gaussian set doesn't appear to diminish to the proc chances for build up. If you are tight for slots and don't want the full set of IO bonuses you certainly aren't required to 6-slot such powers. Some minor brain hemorrhaging was caused in the Blaster forum when I mentioned having Chronos (Time secondary) slotted this way and having put it on Auto. Personally: I'd rather have the short-recharge power I want triggered all the time on Auto than something with a longer recharge like Hasten... which is a better fit for a 'direction bind' IMO. I was accused of wasting the Build Up, but I feel that anytime I'm not doing damage as a blaster to be wasted time.

A tank without taunt thinks he is this But really is this

I think people have the wrong idea that Controller and Dominator procs are supposed to be a Lore-like pet that does a lot more than it does. Dominators and Controllers do have access to pets from Primary/Secondary power sets... the specific complaint about these two ATO procs feel a little bit too much like a spoiled child complaining that they didn't get a better car for their 16th birthday. Keep in mind that ATO are meant to be used over the life of a character and that are not 'rewards' for achieving level 50. I slotted the Dominator's Fiery Orb as early as possible. It collects aggro at a valuable clip that would otherwise go against the Dom, and serves a very useful purpose. My only complaint about Fiery Orb proc is also my complaint against the Winter set procs: sometimes the visual effect doesn't match my character concept. The Energy Font proc is one I slotted later in a Controller build. Over the life of that character I observed the font taking less damage, but I suspect that is because I already had strong mass controls by the time I slotted it. I can easily believe it is contributing to the magnitude of my controls. I have bigger issues with Tanker and Mastermind ATOs (could be ignorance, and I am willing to be educated): Masterminds: The options for slotting these are rather limited in a Mastermind build. I'm not sure what the fix is for these. Tankers: I'm disappointed that (because of the damage-power focus of ATO) one of the two ATO isn't specifically for the Primary. I understand that the primaries are different enough that it would be hard to figure out a way that best balanced Resist/Defense/Absorb. I suppose the tanker ATOs are also better suited for leveling builds and not end-game builds. I'm perfectly happy with procs for the Soldiers of Arachnos, as I suspect most veteran VEAT players are. A %Global damage proc will always be seen as gravy, and the %Fear effect is a nice control option for multiple playstyles (over the entire life of the VEAT).

/bind n target_custom_near enemy alive

Is the thumb in this analogy the forums, and is the hammer threads like this one?

I'm usually seeing teams run Positron in the 10-20 level. YMMV. At level 10, I don't expect the tanks to have Taunt (since AFAIK, it is a level 12 power across secondaries). But at the lower levels, Tanks really shouldn't be going heavy on Attack powers, and all of the Primaries are probably not a good idea either... all these things take Endurance, which is very precious for Tankers. The P2W prestige attacks are probably filling attack chains anyway at the lowest levels. I suppose Tankers could be dipping into Power Pools, but for a Tanker to forgo Taunt to pick a non-travel pool power seems like a weird choice. One 8-player PUGs for Positron, it simply isn't possible to gather and hold the aggro of all the spawns using only an aura and punchvoke.

I've witnessed several people 'taunting' Tanks during Posi 1 and 2, which are at levels below ROFLstomping. With enough defense, there is zero need for the type of 'tanking' you are describing.

This isn't tanking... this is cannon fodder. In the scenario you describe, the team is doing all the work.

If you only ever play solo, no one will care if you have Taunt. If you ever team, many(*) teammates will have a low opinion of you as a tank. There are things a solo Tank can do with Taunt, but you can't Tank for a team without Taunt. A big part of Tanking involves grabbing aggro from your teammates on top of whatever else you are doing. (*) I can't promise that some teammates won't be laughing at you as they peel enemies off of you.

1. Seems too specific to be correct 2. Seems too general to be correct 3. Could be a market niche. See below 4. I think it could still be a market niche, but the behavior isn't niche. 5. Incorrect. 6. Hmmm. For me, a Market Niche is a specific place where I specifically 'start', shooting for a specific result that I am comfortable with the average return I am going to get from that place. I'll invent a make-believe market niche that doesn't currently work (because I'm only mostly EbilTM). If I have a feel that a lot of builds are going to pay a decent price for Celerity +Stealth, I would consider this a niche if I purposely started with the Running pool (presumably Quickfoot) and craft/convert until I 'rolled' into +Stealth. I have presumably done the math and recognized that the return on the pieces I am crafting is work enough more than my investment to make it worthwhile. I want it to be profitable, but that doesn't mean it is. A market niche is a limited space where the marketeer is comfortable working that market element. For example: The "Number Available" for most "proc" pieces often FAR exceeds the demand for the piece. I can see why some players might think that the "proc" is the most valuable piece in the set (I blame Panacea and Performance Shifter) and so consider these to be valuable market niches... but in reality the number of valuable proc pieces is quite limited. I think selling Converters in the Auction House would be considered the simplest example of a market niche. At most there is only one activity to perform (outside the marketplace) and the only decision is literally the lowest sale price.

I don't usually shop for Rare salvage (the SG base accumulates Rare salvage, and I mostly only use it to craft PVP and Purple recipes) but the only price increased I've noticed is with Uncommon salvage. It's still below the cap (100 KInf) but above the rock-bottom prices it was at for most of the previous year (~5Kinf). Uncommon salvage occupies an odd place in the game: it is used in all IO recipes above common, as well as in many Empowerment buffs. If players are following some of the most popular "make Inf quick in the AH" guides, they rely on Uncommon salvage. My anecdotal observation is that the purchase price of Rare IO pieces has (on average) come down.

ENERGY MELEE votes YES! But I must vote NO. Better to balance the power sets, or offer new sets.

The Robotics primary Repair power is 100% skippable. Heal Other is much more useful. Now, having written this... I respec-ed out of the Medicine pool completely... after a certain level I found that my MM didn't need to micromanage the health of my pets. This was independent of how I was playing (i.e. as a tankermind or not). My main MM's secondary is Traps, so I invested in Triage Beacon instead. This is no substitute for a healing power, but for a team of 'bots against swarms of enemies it is as much attention I want to spend on their health. While leveling up: I skipped the Rifle attacks and focused on Pool powers to vary my play options. I used the Concealment pool (Grant Invisibility), Medicine, Teleportation (Teleport Foe, Recall Friend), Flight (Group Fly with pets is fun!). It was only after lvl 50 that I respec-ed into the Rifle attacks... but that was specifically to add KnockDown into the attacks (because the Bots also had knockdown and I wanted the enemies to sit in the fire patch) and to have the option to draw aggro from the bots.

I don't run time as a MM secondary, but I do use bots as the primary. Like many MMs I use keybinds to make my spawning and buffing go faster. I don't use the masterclass binds, but something a little more homebrewed with the numpad. Mileage varies, and everyone has their own methods for pet controls. I use the numpad0 to summon the bots, and ALT+numpad0 to upgrade with the primary powers. CTRL+Numpad (1,2,3) targets the (next) closest visible bot of a specific Tier. ALT+Numpad (1,2,3) is bound to a specific power (Grant Invisibility) that can be tossed on a bot of the specific Tier. The (circular) summoning chain starts with this keybind: /bind numpad0 "sg Battle Drones$$+down$$-down$$pow_exec_location me Battle Drones$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\summon_bot_2.txt" and then I have 3 single-line text files summon_bot_1.txt: numpad0 "sg Battle Drones$$+down$$-down$$pow_exec_location me Battle Drones$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\summon_bot_2.txt" summon_bot_2.txt: numpad0 "sg Protector Bots$$+down$$-down$$pow_exec_location me Protector Bots$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\summon_bot_3.txt" summon_bot_3.txt: numpad0 "sg Assault Bot$$+down$$-down$$pow_exec_location me Assault Bot$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\summon_bot_1.txt" For simply targeting the bots, I have keybinds to target a bot of a given tier (default names used): /bind ctrl+numpad1 "target_name Battle Drone" /bind ctrl+numpad2 "target_name Protector Bot" /bind ctrl+numpad3 "target_name Assault Bot" The upgrade path uses a similar "circular" keybind and textfiles: /bind alt+numpad0 "sg Equipping Bots$$+down$$-down$$powexec_name Equip Robot$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\bot_upgrade_2.txt" bot_upgrade_1.txt: alt+numpad0 "sg Equipping Bots$$+down$$-down$$powexec_name Equip Robot$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\bot_upgrade_2.txt" bot_upgrade_2.txt: alt+numpad0 "sg Upgrading Bots$$+down$$-down$$powexec_name Upgrade Robot$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\bot_upgrade_1.txt" The powers Equip Robot and Upgrade Robot are AoE, so you only need to target a single bot to hit them all (after summoning). They keep their upgrades across maps and zones. If you are going to cast a single non-AoE power on the bots (I use Grant Invisibility and it works similarly for Aid Other) , you can mimic what I did, starting with keybinds: /bind numpad1 "+down$$-down$$target_name Battle Drone$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\bd_invis_2.txt" /bind numpad2 "+down$$-down$$target_name Protector Bot$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\pb_invis_2.txt" /bind numpad3 "+down$$-down$$target_name Assault Bot$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\ab_invis_2.txt" and then each of the bots has another 'circular' set of txt files. For example the battle drone files are: bd_invis_1.txt: numpad1 "+down$$-down$$target_name Battle Drone$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\bd_invis_2.txt" bd_invis_2.txt: numpad1 "+down$$-down$$powexec_name Grant Invisibility$$bind_load_file j:\\COH_binds\bd_invis_1.txt" I use the 'floating powers bar' to hold icons for pet controls, including: /macro_image "PetCommand_action_Goto" "GoTo" "petcom_all goto" /macro_image "PetCommand_Action_Dismiss" "Dismiss" "petcom_all dismiss" /macro_image "PetCommand_Action_Stay" "Stay" "petcom_all stay" /macro_image "PetCommand_Action_Follow" "Follow" "petcom_all follow" /macro_image "PetCommand_Stance_Defensive" "Protect" "+down$$-down$$petcom_all follow$$petcom_all defensive$$" /macro_image "PetCommand_Action_Dismiss" "Dismiss" "petcom_all dismiss"

That sound like fun, but there is yet another direction we could go: It should be possible to make a 'challenging' arc for characters with a max level of 16. I chose lvl 16 because it should be far enough below the level of the lvl 25 IO sets, but would still allow for PVP, ATO, Winter, Purple sets to contribute to builds. Obviously this does not allow players to play their full end-game builds, but writing only for myself: I enjoy taking end-game builds back through low level content to see how they perform. I fell like the Positron TFs are actually pretty good at offering lower level teams a challenge and requiring teamwork, even if the final Posi TF2 mission doesn't require that much coordination. Once past those first two hero TFs, it feels like far less 'teamwork' is required to get through the TF missions. I realize there are limits on which enemy mobs can be used at low levels, but I'm curious if anyone has built an AE arc in this direction?

I would caution against this specific advice, in this case. I agree that Rune of Protection is useful for the exact reason stated, but in the case of a Dominator that isn't chasing a lot of Global Recharge, the Rune of Protection will not be available as often as you might want it. It is probably a better choice just to have a column of Break Free inspirations if the power is just going to be used as a panic button. For comparison: The only toon I have that has (and uses) Rune of Protection is my perma-Hasten Blaster. I don't use it that often, but against certain enemy types I find myself using it quite frequently. For the Dominator I mainly play, I have Indomitable Will (form Epic Psi) filling the 'panic button' role, although it is a lvl 49 choice and acting as a LotG mule. My main Dominator is Fire/Psi/Psi... and it 'feels' like playing a shopper when the doors first open at a Black Friday sales event. My build has an overabundance of 'opening moves', which means that I really have too many options but "I play me, you play you". Depending on how the attack opens, I either spam the other options or start to focus on actively taking out the enemies. In my case, I have to decide between which of the following 'controls' to start a fight, roughly in the order of preference: Fire Cages (AoE immob which spawns Fiery Orb... prevents Knockback on enemies) Flashfire (AoE stun, with the +Damage proc ATO) Bonfire (Location AoE control w/ KB->KD, part of my Global Recharge chain) Drain Psyche (self +Regen) Cinders (AoE Hold) For this Dominator, I purposely tried to avoid Melee attacks. I have a significant number of Melee toons and with the lockdowns here I prefer to toggle between targets and fire off ranged attacks. Life would be even crazier if I was dashing between targets (which I already do to an extent with PBAoE Psychic Shockwave and the cone Psychic Scream). While all *this* madness is going on, I'm keeping an eye on Hasten (while up, Global Recharge is at +192%, and with the +Recharge proc have plenty of time to not worry about special keybinds) and the Pets, as well as any scoping for enemies who didn't get locked down but are now running off because of Hot Feet or World of Confusion. This guy is 'on the bubble' of PermaDom (without Hasten) so I'm relying on a cast of Bonfire (which triggers all of its procs 100%) to have both PermaDom and PermaHasten. I could reconfigure 2 powers and choose a different IO set to have PermaDom without Hasten, but I'm not a fan of the replacement set for the particular power. The alternative would be swapping my Travel pool to allow for a 5th LotG, but then I'd still have to reconfigure another power to hold a mule! Decisions, decisions... All part of the Dominator game.