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Without being too critical: pull the 6th slot from Sniper Blast, get the full x6 set of Coercive Persuasion.... the extra defense from the 6th piece is quite nice. Seeds of Confusion doesn't really need the enhancement, but this is not a set to stop at 5 IMO

Lord Schweinzer is IMO somewhat trivial to unlock, but it involves swapping to blue side and doing the Dakota Berg (Brickstown) entry in "Who Will Die?" arc at a something like x3 (I'm not sure if x2 will be enough) to get "Bloody Hands". Some recent-ish updates have made it easier to get Agent Hassell unlocked via Villain Disruptor, but I haven't found a single mission (either side) that can get it for me. The least painful, but still grindy, way for me is to run the first SSA 1 arc repeatedly, now that the final mission's enemy counts. There is quite a bit of red side content (including patron arcs) that provides both heroes and villains (for both badges), but these aren't quick. See also some villains in higher level TFs (Kahn, etc.) Finally: I believe the 20-29 Frostfire Vigilante morality (alignment changing/confirming) mission offers more than one potential villain to count towards the badge. I used to run the PI radio missions to get the safeguard and fight the bank robber and the jail breaker, but that is also somewhat grindy.

I also mix them up: The advantages of contact missions are (IMO, in no particular order): Badges, Merit rewards (for certain arcs) "Newer" contact missions are often all in the same zone (think blueside Hollows, Faultline, Striga, Croatoa, etc.) Most of the game's lore is exposed through these The advantages of newspaper/radio mission (again, MMV) With only a few exceptions, they will be in the zone you pick them up They can (mostly) be completed quickly There is a little bit of player agency for choosing enemies The eventually unlock Mayhem/Safeguard missions The advantages of Safeguard/Mayhem missions Badges, and progress towards badges Temp powers The advantages of Tip missions Progress on alignment, badges unlocking 40-merit Morality missions some minor (sometimes funny!) lore potential exposure to more varied enemy types Of these, the biggest drawbacks are IMO: Tip missions can be 'buggy'; they often have multiple triggering things that can get real screwy Contact missions can have some pretty lame objectives (e.g. find 12 special mobs, plus defeat alls) Newspaper/Radio can have escort missions, one of the villain Mayhem objectives can be a kidnap The ONLY thing that players can miss out on by "leveling too quickly" are: Tip Missions can be out-leveled and cannot be done for lower level ranges (20-29, 30-39) Certain non-badge, non-merit contact missions can be out-leveled Neither of these affects 'badge hunters' AFAIK.

I've been thinking about this one a lot recently. Mostly because I've been playing a Scrapper recently, a little bit because of another thread I don't feel like mentioning. There were plenty of times when I'd watch a solo runner, on the ground, go more than 250 feet away before slowly coming back. Fliers did the same, just much faster. This is not a problem on my ranged attackers or control types. I couldn't think of a a good solution to propose. This behavior was seen as some important part of critter AI, implementing it *did* eliminate trivial gaining of XP. I looked a little at the potential implications of scaling up some damage sets, but that was misguided I think. I think the "fairest" idea that crossed my mind was this: What if enemy critters that went into "escape mode" got a movement debuff/penalty, so that there was a slightly better chance for melee types to get them before they high-tail it? I don't know if that is a very elegant solution, and it would spoil some of the game I think.

I can't speak to all toggles, but AFAIK for many (if not most) the answer is "yes, the toggle will be available sooner with a Recharge enhancement than without." The times may be short enough that it is barely noticeable. As a practical matter, I am rather certain *I* only observe this on powers where I end up slotting pieces of a set which includes /Recharge Time components... such as Maneuvers or powers that are Resistance toggles.

I find myself looking at Epic/Patron pools (for each AT) with one of two perspectives: The build has some gaps that the pool can help to fill, There is a power (or two) in the pool that I feel especially compliments the concept In my stable of characters, it runs roughly 4-to-1 in favor of the first. This is mostly because I like my characters to feel 'complete' by level 30, with a little bit of my 'character concept' drives AT/Primary/Secondary more than anything else. Part of this "completeness" feeling extends into picking up (explicit) ranged attacks at level 35+. Mileage varies of course. My thinking specific to Controllers follows: Usually I've sunk so many slots into the primary and secondary that I don't have many spare slots to dedicate to epic/patron pool powers. Especially when I look at a "level 50" build, Controllers generally have fewer opportunities (in terms of power choices) where to slot their ATO... and if I want some ranged attacks, there isn't anything stopping me from picking them up from 'regular' power pools earlier than level 35. As a practical matter, when there isn't a specific power I want at level 35+ from a pool, I tend to lean into pools that allow me to mule Resistance and/or Defense Enhancement sets. Psionic is one choice, and IIRC each of the Patron pools allows for a Resistance toggle at level 35 with no pre-requisites (beyond having opened the Patron pools).

Sometimes, finding objectives is like...

Domination offers three benefits: The Controls are more powerful <- see comments above about which sets this makes a big difference for It offers resistance to controls It refills the Blue Bar Perma-dom is getting domination again, before it expires. If Domination expires, you must refill the domination bar to use it again. You probably know all this but I thought I'd mention it. To get the global recharge necessary for perma-dom, I believe the minimal value is 123%, rounded up, but because it is easy to get 'stuck' in an animation, every little bit above this is useful. Hasten IIRC offers 95% global recharge. Hasten doesn't need to be 'perma' for Dominators. I prefer to achieve perma-dom without Hasten, and also without FF +Recharge pieces, but mileage varies. The disadvantage of my approach is that the slots and set bonuses required to get global recharge for perma-dom aren't feasible until level 50... so taking Hasten while leveling is a reasonable compromise for me. One sly effect of getting high global recharge will be that it becomes easier to spam attacks/controls, which will burn the blue bar faster. Dominators tend to live on the edge of a knife.

^this^ is sort of my point about how the Kheldian non-human forms are effectively channeling and old-school manner of thinking. Specific to Dwarf form: my recollection from Live was that in some place like Bloody Bay, with the old/Live level requirements for power picks, was that a reasonably slotted (but not particularly heavily slotted) Dwarf could hold off entire teams in PVP... sort of like how a level 50 Tanker could do it in RV, but much easier. This is one of the memories that reminds me that for the level at which the forms unlock, the Kheldians are quite impressive. Dwarfs, with minimal (PB)AoE are never going to be as good at spawn-clearing as other ATs.... but the tricks they have in Dwarf form make them good (old-school) pocket tanks. My thinking is that the primary reason to leave the "changeling exploit" in place is to allow players who want to use it to feel like their Kheldians are keeping pace with other ATs to do so. Any potential revamp would be a LOT of effort, and whatever direction chosen to revamp isn't likely to be the one a majority of players are asking for.

Alternative read: ppl tried it and found it to be of relatively low value.

Is there a technical reason why the F10 Battle Cry is limited to 32 characters? I'm not asking for even as many as 64, but 32 is often too short to write a simple sentence.

I pass no judgement! I usually bridge those low levels with temporary attacks from START. They are also endurance hogs, but I feel like I have more agency. My comment was made more of a general observation on enemy-affecting PBAoE toggles. There are some that work for me, many more that do not (especially on squishier characters). Minimally I find that they need to be slotted for both Accuracy and Endurance Reduction before even considering whatever the actual effect of them is supposed to be!

w.r.t. Hot Feet... this is one of those PBAoE toggles that initially looks appealing to me, but in practice is something I find very hard to make work without a lot of slots (for the entire build, if not the PBAoE toggle itself). These sorts of powers have lots of theoretical uses, but in practice don't pan out well for me. YMMV. Once of the competing issues I've found with such powers is that enemy critters are often too spread out (by their nature and/or by application of controls) that their isn't as much return for the (Endurance, slots) choice to use the PBAoE toggle as opposed to investing in some other power. I've taken it, but it was never something I used semi-regularly until near end-build... by then I have the slots and I can turn up spawn sizes.

My advice is to try different things. Try different ATs, different powers, different pools, different slotting choice, different strategies, different content. Eventually, each of will land somewhere and think what we are doing (with respect to whatever) is "optimal"... but no matter whatever, that assessment, even if correct, is only true for the limited scope of yardsticks we have to apply. Even a question as simple as this has different possible answers, depending on many variables: Many players shoot through levels 1-20 so quickly such that the question might not even be relevant to them! There is a sort of "correct answer" with respect to relative enhancement values between slotting choices, but the 'best answer' might be informed by less abstract and more specific (to the character, to the player account) details.

Obviously we all have to declare the user with the most posts in the thread the winner, and then everyone will be satisfied.

The Mace is essentially necessary for a lot of what the Hunstman/Bane does best(*1), once you get to the madatory respec I *think* you can replace all of the 'gun' attacks with an equivalent 'mace' attack.... I'm not entirely certain because for my most recent Bane I preferred gun attacks over mace attacks for flavor. (*1) "best" is somewhat flexible... as the team-buffs (and Surveillance) are very good and don't rely on the weapon choice. I'm referring to the self-boosts (Build Up) and high-DPS melee attacks (Shatter, Crowd Control) which will always use the Mace. As for team toggles, my most recent build uses CT: Defensive, TT: Maneuvers, TT: Leadership (all by level 20) and the after level 38 has CT: Offensive and TT: Assault, as well as Maneuvers (Leadership pool, as a mule for Karma's KB protection). I didn't bother with a patron pool for this most recent build, but Mace Mastery is a sort-of no-brainer. If Wide Area Web Grenade requires a gun that you don't want to use, the Mace Mastery pool offers an alternative using the Mace with Web Envelope. I rather like having the low-level AoE immobilize, I'm not sure how I'd feel about it as a patrol pool choice. If you are going for the stealth aspect, obviously Cloaking Device is a must, and I think Placate will greatly improve performance. I ended up with 3 pieces of Mocking Beratement in Placate: Accuracy/Recharge, Threat/Recharge, Threat/Range. I recommend taking those two powers in succession... which one is taken first is up to you if you delay the choice.

For concept, and what it offers, I think Earth. You should be able to recolor some of the Earth powers to fit. with a Marine secondary, Leviathan mastery is pretty reasonable IMO. With some slots, both Bile Spray and Water Spout can be made to work for Controllers, Hibernate can mule the %Absorb piece and Shark Skin can mule Resistance pieces. Typically: My Controllers don't have many slots available for powers when the Epic/Patrons become available. As a result, I usually consider those for what powers offer me the chance to mule enhancements and/or enhancement sets. Psionic often gets tapped for these on my builds for this reason.

The unique Overwhelming Force set IIR has a proc that also contains a Damage Enhancing component, as well as a piece that is a rare combination of Endurance Reduction/Recharge.

It's been a while since I did that mission, but I very recently had the Capture Eukrisal and his research mission where Eukrisal (who was in the last spawn I needed to clear) vanished from the map. The map did one other weird thing: it showed me red markers (for CoT things still on the map, like crystals and cage doors) for a split-second, and then stopped showing them. I spent about 20 minutes trying to find anything else to defeat/destroy but he never re-appeared. I ended up auto-completing that one. I did submit a ticket but the response ended up being much later, so the debugging opportunity was lost.

I'd be happy to be wrong! Although it means I'm taking too long to do what should only take an hour!

The ones I typically use only last 60 minutes... and by selecting several different ones I see all sorts of different durations! EDIT: As a practical matter, I regularly grab about 5 different SG boosts at the same time, and those all expire at almost exactly the same time (1 hour). Maybe "time flies when you are having fun"?

I am ignoring the "changeling exploit" for what follows. As I have written before: the general issue I see with Kheldians is that for reasons the multiforms aren't very good to play across all (levels of) content... and without multi-forms, we players will miss what is supposed to make them fun an unique. The reasons? #1 Nova form gets a "full suite" of blaster-like attacks, but they all pretty much scale like low-level Blaster attacks. On the one hand, this is to be expected. Nova form is pretty OP between levels 4 and 16... it has a 'complete' attack chain, and can fly... these things were not common in the early days of Live for low level characters! But imagine how poorly Blasters would perform if they only could use their first four or five primary powers. #2 Dwarf form get A+ resistances, as well as mechanisms to "tank", but very little in the way of offense to clear enemies. Dwarf form comes later, so it scales better (as a sort of Tank), but it never really gets any "better" at clearing spawns. Yes, we have found ways to work around this... but an always-Dwarf is going to be pretty bad at map clearing. #3 The Human form don't get trivial access to some of the important things Dwarf and Nova bring: Mezz protection (Dwarf) is a big one, but so is +ToHit from Nova. The end result is that it becomes necessary to swap forms to cover obvious gaps in whatever toolbox we need for the moment... and that some of those tools (namely the Nova attacks) generally aren't up to higher level content. There are many ways to address these issues, but at their core, I think the Kheldians are more of a unique story-mode AT designed to allow players to do different things, but to not excel. Again, I am not saying they can't be excellent... more that if a player wants a better Blaster/Tanker then picking a Kheldian is not going to be the first best choice. Personally? I find non-changeling-exploit defeat times to be a real mood killer solo. On teams, I have the luxury to swap forms and playstyles as needed.

FWIW: The text of some of the SG buffs says 90 minutes, but I don't think I've used one yet that lasts longer than 60 minutes... at least not for many years (if ever the durations were different).