FFTMime

What I am saying is I have criminally and habitually bad taste and no one is to blame but me. I cannot be happy playing things that just work, it seems.

Nothing specific, but my usual interaction with things goes along the lines of wanting to play this AT but the powersets or combo I want to use is bad. Where my option is to play something that's not conceptual that does work instead. But I don't wanna. Getting concept and acceptable levels of performance to meet is difficult.

While I admit it has to be right, it still makes me lament I can't play my personal flavor of gremlin and not have a shitty time.

If the event is over, why is the mapserver still attacking me while trying to do Positron TF?

I like the concept of scrappers, but gameplay flow is a different issue entirely. Which is something I seem to mind more now than when I played way back on live, and I was definitely on the young side for the userbase. My shift in point of view is pretty obvious now that I'm back with a direct comparison of the same things. If you're going to go for something, why not go to the extreme? Mediocrity is a terrible thing.. at least in a video game. Where risks aren't really risks and wasting your time is the point anyway. If I wanted to WRITE, it would probably be a scrapper type. Tough enough to take care of problems, but not so invincible as to truly be invincible. Yet in gameplay terms you're more getting the unbuttered toast of gameplay. For those about to type that they LOVE toast even when unbuttered.. that's the point of the comparison. Yes. Lmao. Cause if I want to do damage, I have tons of options that are high risk high reward and engaging. If I am tired of dying to petty mistakes and want to feel strong, I can be a tank and be one of the best contributions a team can have to boot. If I want to be a support, I am simply spoiled for choice. If I want soloing to be a minigame, I could play dominators. Scrappers exist in this weird zone of both safe enough but also not spectacular either. While bringing fairly straight forward gameplay. It's a weird problem to have cause it's like complaining you're dying of success. There's nothing WRONG with scrappers, but that's kind of also the issue? That they aren't weird, fugly, or halfcocked?

No start at +4/x8 at level 1 or your weakness will be noted among the people for generations.

I really don't know why I keep forgetting the poor stalkers. Maybe mission scripting in a lot of more modern missions breaking their playstyle so badly takes me out of them.

Edit: Oh no.

I have seen a variant of this when the team is 5 blasters out of a possible 8 team slots. Usually on the order of, "Oh boy here we go."

Blapping, you mean? Blapping is a whole other can of worms. Get to love jousting. And I think it's something that really only matures later anyway? Devices is strong though. AR/Dev is a classic combo for a reason. That said, even devices has the ONE melee attack. Taser. Which I highly recommend over web grenade. And keep it on a key you can mash in haste in a pinch. It does silly damage. You'll need it. edit: I don't even have my taser slotted. This thing just hits like a train.

You need your wombo combo well slotted and hope you don't miss. Know what your approach is and lay down your combo. Don't deviate. Wash rinse repeat. Be ready with your single target control power if things don't quite go to plan. That's the basic gist. AOE heavy sets should really lean into that. Single targets should lean into that. I would not play against type for blasters. They aren't good for it. That said, some sets are more forgiving thanks to their 'control'. Ice isn't as strong feeling, but I found it to be reliable in carrying me around. I will say high risk high reward sets are GREAT fun though. Putting up with the learning curve is worth it. And one thing to keep in mind. It's better to have a few well slotted powers than a bunch of half slotted ones. Blasters can tempt you with being spoiled for choice, but you really should have your primary combo going. This is going to be important for avoiding pain while leveling.

I confess I would appreciate some coherent advice on making dominators.. work. They felt bad on live. Not quite so bad here, but they still can't really perform.

You know, I expected that to rile someone, but I didn't expect anyone to suddenly turn and shoot the masterminds...

I keep hearing it's bad, but nothing ventured nothing gained. Time to take Deka around as a SS/Regen brute. I seem to be a fan of horrible ideas anyway.

Yeah, villains and heroes mixing has given us an excess of choices not meant to be together. You get weird choices like why be a brute when you can be a tank. Or why be a defender when you can corrupt? Why be a dominator when you can play an AT that actually works....

Energy. Inv. 1 million influence to buy a surfboard to travel on...

I really want to try a regen brute but I keep failing on what to pair it with. I played MA to death on live, but I never really 'got' anything else. Then again, leveling then was much slower. So the cost of trying anything was very high.

I honestly fail to remember FF ever having favorable impressions at any point from live. Even for defenders, it just kind of exists. It doesn't help you much, and if something truly goes wrong with your teammates you can't do anything. Giving them melee tier protection was already your contribution. So, in practice it can feel pretty bad even if it's doing what it should very well. The rare FF I experienced on live was always appreciated, though. Particularly as a regen scrapper who's major issue is being hit in the first place. Might be a bit of a feedback issue. Though that you can't bubble yourself effectively also kind of bites.

I knew a stone tanker from live that wouldn't even use his attack set. Just.. stood around. Immune. XP slowly racking up. Now there are surely better XP farms, but it was an impressive statement of stone's powers. Long before you could stack tons of power pools. Just food for thought. If you're willing to build around the downsides, this set is nothing short of violently incredible and probably OP. With the general improvements to tankers, and free stamina pool, this is even sillier. Edit: And if I recall his solution to the 'drawbacks', it was.. just take teleport. Fastest travel power anyway.

I think part of the issue is having three melee AT's in the first place. If I'm going to be brutally honest about design choices of yesteryear. On that note, one spooky solution people may not like is picking one to center things around while the others are left as relics for those who are fond of them. Simplifies what to center game design around a lot. Similarly to how Willpower probably has always been the real Regeneration rework and why Regen never got a direct one. Particularly now that, uh, villain/hero AT's don't have exclusivity to red or blue sides.

I mean.. any ranged + armor AT is destined to mediocrity by function? The very idea of sentinels is as a safer AT to play all around. If they did something truly fantastic, you'd crunch an entire other AT. To people who are tired of randomly going splat playing ranged, survival is fantastic enough. Sometimes you want to feel more like Iron Man than Iron Sissy. It has a certain appeal to it, but playing them also made me finally just PLAY A BLASTER...

Well since this is necro'd anyway... What pairs well with AR then? As I'm growing quite fond of the set, but I'll agree with the observation that devices is a strategy set. Targeting drone is nice, but a lot of what devices is doing isn't necessarily helping how I'm playing.

I'm not 50 yet, but I confirm AR/DEV is the YOLO life. If you screw up your combo, you're in trouble. Then again, you're also AR/DEV. You can pry yourself out of some nasty situations on that alone. I REALLY keep underestimating just how well I can do that in a pinch. No wonder my friend used to main Shoot Man.

Trying Ar/Dev and I ended up dropping trip mine. Sadly. I found any effort put in to being sure they pay for reaching me was better spent shredding them in the first place... but it is a fun power. I can't contest that. Particularly if you remote bomb a boss then trip mine their feet... Now there's a funny stealth build.

I did try ice/ice in the more lucrative period of xp gain in the event. People doing entire TF's in only an hour really helps leveling. I was not impressed with the damage, but the level of stability it has as an entity is impressive. Though I guess this asks what kind of goal one has. Something more blatantly damaged focused is actually probably better for groups. As grouping tends to be super saturated with support, debuffs, and such as it is. Hitting your 'everything dies now' button you can't use solo without setup is a nice feeling. Also the mid level blues is real. Blasters sure change tempo a lot across level ranges. Relearning how to stay competitive when things suddenly change is...