Zepp

Empathic Investment Siren's - > Howl - > Shockwave X4-5ish Howl - > Shockwave X8-10ish Rinse & Repeat Also, cutting down times would not deal with the fact that troller/dom sleeps tend to be shorter durations. Some excessively short... There are other fairly high speed long duration blaster/buff sleeps out there. They make sense in context, but you are suggesting making a solo play isolation mechanic a team CC balance nightmare...

Either add some damage to Gale, or make O2 an AoE heal, or both... These two powers are the only two that kinda are on the sucky end... But, yes, there are a lot of stormtroopers out there giving Stormbringers a bad name.

What defined melee powersets proposal did I miss?

If you are perma-hasten (a lot of builds get there) you are looking at 80s or less. That means, if you spam Siren's call for 1/3 of your attacks you will still be doing decent damage and keeping all enemies in a spawn on extreme lockdown beyond troller or dom levels while keeping a more damaging combo the other 2/3s of the time. That means with any blaster, sentinel, or corruptor you can invest four powers (Siren's Call, Empathic Investment, and two unlock) and five-six slots (for or five for Fortunata Hypnosis, and one more to two slot Empathic Investment with Recharge) a 75s mag 3 stun with a 5s cooldown... That is more than a return on investment... There are other powers out there that you can get over half a minute easy with sleep on five-ten second timers. Mesmerize could give you a single-target stun that lasts nigh two minutes... That being said, in general, ranged attack sets have better sleeps than control sets, but the T5 would give high damage ATs easy access to controls that are out of the reach of CC-focused classes...

That last one might be a little OP... Just think about Siren's Call + Flash Freeze + Frozen Aura... That is more than half a minute at Mag 8 stun, around 45s at Mag 5 stun, and well over a minute at Mag 3 stun... and that is without spamming Siren's call every 10s or so... In fact, with Siren's Call alone, you could stack around a Mag 21 AoE stun and keep it up while doing damage... Actually, thinking about the time limit, you would be looking at a perma-hasten level build having it up a third of the time... That means that you would be able to use Siren's Call once every 5s or so, plus animation time, that is around 4 stacks of mag 3 in 30s (lasting around 75s) which means that you would likely still have a mag 9 stun going the next time the T5 was up... realistically speaking...

Finally finished going through all the threads. I think I caught all the suggestions. If I missed any, let me know. Next up is ranged!!!

Battle 1: Manipulator v Protector Manipulator Feasibility: 8 - The porting of sets should be easy, and as a support set balancing issues won't be too overt. Niche: 4 - It sits at a spot between doms and trollers that may be too close to one or both. Interest: 4 - I like control. Protector Feasibility: 6 - The creation and balancing of secondary sets would take some effort. Niche: 5 - I can see this as sufficiently different from a scrapper, but not sure if I would choose it over a scrapper. Interest: 3 - Might as well make a scrapper. Winner: Manipulator Battle 2: The Bastion v Bulwark Guardian Feasibility: 6 - While easy to port powersets, I see balance issues as taking some time, especially with the first part of the inherent. Niche: 4 - It seems to be competing for a niche with Defender. Interest: 2 - It would be fun, but I do not really see why I would choose it over a Defender. Bulwark Feasibility: 7 - While easy to port powersets, I see balance issues as taking some time. Niche: 4 - It seems to be competing for a niche with Defender. Interest: 4 - It would be fun, but I do not really see why I would choose it over a Defender. Winner: Bulwark

Battle 1: Marshal v Zoomer Marshal Feasibility: 7 - While easy to port powersets, I see balance issues as taking some time. Niche: 4 - It seems to be competing for a niche with Mastermind. Interest: 4 - It would be fun, but I it may be frustrating in terms of survivability and pet sustainability. Zoomer Feasibility: 8 - While easy to port powersets, there may be some balance issues. Niche: 9 - This archetype provides a novel feel, and also provides a tool currently not readily available for team fights. Interest: 10 - I really want to try this one out. Winner: Zoomer Battle 2: Tank-Mage v Instigator Take Two Tank-Mage Feasibility: 4 - It is incomplete and the secondary sets would take some time to manage. Niche: 2 - It seems to be competing for a niche with Tankers. They are basically tankier than Tankers, but with less of an impact late-game. Interest: 2 - I like the idea, but with the current meta, they seem like they would be fairly useless once you got to 20. Instigator Take 2 Feasibility: 8 - While easy to port powersets, there may be some balance issues. Niche: 5 - Just different enough from Tankers and Brutes to be considered its own AT. Interest: 6 - I would give it a go. Winner: Instigator Take 2

The winners for the first round are in! Congratulations to Captain, The Duo, Instigator, & Defiler! The next round of voting is open, four new matches! Vote for the battles in the Left Bracket and Right Bracket!

Welcome to The Great Archetype Concept Battle. This is a set of polls wherein proposed Archetypes go head to head to determine community interest. The Polls will be open for approximately one week and the brackets will be updated weekly. The goal is to come up with a single proposed archetype concept that the whole community can rally behind. Voting should be based, in principle, on Feasibility, Niche, & Interest. Feasibility: 1 (difficult to balance, requires a large amount of set development, etc.) to 10 (could be in-game tomorrow) Niche: 1 (is already addressed by another AT) to 10 (there is a hole in the game that this would fill) Interest: 1 (I wouldn't play it) to 10 (I plan to make at least 20 alts in this AT) Your Contestants! Battle 1: Manipulator v Protector Manipulator (19.05.23.13.29.47.02) Manipulation/Control Edge: Non-stacking defense/resistance debuff for specific damage types, with a weak general secondary debuff. Manipulators are a buff/debuff focused controlling AT. Protector (19.07.25.00.33.xx) Melee/{Support/Armor} Honor & Glory: Glory builds stacks through melee attacks and dissipates through inaction or use of buffs, it grants increased buff efficacy. Protectors juggle between support and dps providing teammates with much-needed support while also helping out with clearing the field. Battle 2: Guardian v Bulwark Guardian (19.05.23.15.57.29) Support/Melee Coverage: Ally buffs also buff the Guardian. Scaling HP boost per nearby enemies. Guardians offer support from within the fray. Bulwark (19.08.02.11.18.xx) Support/Melee {Positive/Negative} Reinforcement: Use of support boosts the effects of support while decreasing damage and to hit, attacks boost damage and to hit, but decrease the efficacy of support. Bulwarks are front-line support, offering buffs and debuffs from within the fray.

Welcome to The Great Archetype Concept Battle. This is a set of polls wherein proposed Archetypes go head to head to determine community interest. The Polls will be open for approximately one week and the brackets will be updated weekly. The goal is to come up with a single proposed archetype concept that the whole community can rally behind. Voting should be based, in principle, on Feasibility, Niche, & Interest. Feasibility: 1 (difficult to balance, requires a large amount of set development, etc.) to 10 (could be in-game tomorrow) Niche: 1 (is already addressed by another AT) to 10 (there is a hole in the game that this would fill) Interest: 1 (I wouldn't play it) to 10 (I plan to make at least 20 alts in this AT) Your Contestants! Battle 1: Marshal v Zoomer Marshal (19.05.23.13.29.47.01) Assault/Pet [placeholder]: Scaling resistance for main and pets based on nearby enemies. This is a shock and awe set that focuses on running in and absorbing the alpha and then fading in the background for cleanup. Zoomer (19.07.25.22.56.xx) Manipulation/Assault Zoom: Personal +SPD for ranged, enemy -SPD for melee, and increased speed cap. Zoomers offer the feel of playing a speedster while providing access to two AT-specific power sets that are versatile an fun. Battle 2: Tank-Mage v Instigator Take Two Tank-Mage (19.05.23.17.14.14) Armor/{Control/Melee} [placeholder]: A tank that focuses on both aggro management and controlling enemies through, well, controlling enemies. Instigator Take 2 (19.07.27.22.25.xx) Assault/Armor Instigation & Resolve: They have an inherent punchvoke ability, Instigation, similar to Tankers, they also have a secondary inherent that provides stacks of absorb while out of combat. Instigators are mobile meat shields in the truest sense. Tankers are frontline tanks, Brutes are scrapperlocked tanks, Instigators go to where the aggro is (stupid Blaster AoEs).

Gale and O2 boost changes are somewhat fine - Gale could use some damage and O2 boost could be changed to a self & ally-heal PBAoE. Hurricane is more useful with the repel for herding minions in a corner (works especially well with wormhole or TP enemy). Lightning storm is fine as is. If you read the troller forums, you'd see that Storm is popular as is. It requires a bit more skill and plays very differently from buff sets, but it is a good and popular set as is.

But what about my PowerPool Petless Mastermind? Only half kidding. PowerPool Powers are good for filling in the gaps, but having them on-par with the best powers in kits will mean that PowerSets that sacrifice some damage for CC or other aspects would turn more towards PowerPools, decreasing Power Variation and flavor.

If you click the timestamp for a specific post, it links to that post. This allows you to link to a specific post without using pages. I try to avoid referring to pages as those numbers are subject to change. However, some people make references such as "this thread is now 14 pages long" or "if you look at page three of the thread" in their comments rather than linking to a specific post or specifying the number of responses. On forums that are reasonable (allow user preferences) these comments do not always make sense. Which is why I have followed best practices of linking directly to a specific post for a long time now... Would I like the ability to set the forum to 100 posts per page. Yes, it would save me loads of time. Is it a top priority for me? No.

I was looking at the original division between CoH ATs and CoV ATs and was thinking about how to conceptualize the ATs. This is a simplified, but informative, conceptualization. For the Ranged ATs: Blaster and Defender, the middle ground was Corruptor. Defender and Controller, the middle ground was Mastermind. Controller, Blasters, and Scrappers, the middle ground was Dominator. For the Melee ATs: DPS-Mitigation spectrum - Stalker-Scrapper-Brute-Tanker. This addressed a lot of the complaints with the original CoH ATs, and created a lot of overlap when the two were merged. Are any of the ATs redundant? No. Is there overlap/redundancy in group roles? Yes. Is it worth taking a look at the data and seeing if the Melee spectrum reflects the realities of the post-incarnate CoH without ignoring the pre-incarnate content? Definitely. Is there evidence that Tankers are a completely redundant AT that need to be fixed? Other than a possible argument for raising the damage cap for high-end content, not really.

Not sure about your situation, but my wife never lets me put marital as secondary...

If someone has the time, can they comb through the old Pylon thread for Brutes and Tankers and see if there really is a significant difference?

It would probably be a good idea to merge this into the T9 Defensive crash thread

I think fly is fine, but TP needs a huge endurance cost reduction...

I could see raising the damage cap for Tankers, but there does not seem to be much of an actual difference in real numbers. There may be some outliers, but changes ought to be based on data rather than anecdotes.

Alright, I've been following the Instigator T2 thread, and was wondering if people thought that the Zoomer would work better as Assault Manipulation rather than the other way around? That would give the toon a little more oomph early game. What this would mean is that you would generally have a choice of melee or ranged for the primary and a ranged immobilize for the secondary, rather than a choice of ranged immobilize or melee for the primary and a ranged damage for the secondary. It would also delay your acquisition of sustain powers to later in the game. Also, to simplify implementation of the inherent, I was basically thinking: speed caps are 20% higher than other ATs, 10% universal speed increase, 10% base range increase for teleportation powerpool, and a scaling -Spd buff on all attacks in addition to a chance to placate. It would simplify implementation and make your attack choice more open to the individual rather than railroading the ranged-melee seesaw... Also, for reference: Assault generally has about 2 melee, 3 ranged (excluding snipes), 1 melee AoE, 1 ranged AoE, 1 boost, and 1 special (often a snipe, sometimes a toggle, or something else). Manipulation generally has five key points, T1 Immobilize, T2 ST Melee, T4 Boost, T6 Sustain, & T7 Utility. Now, these are not universal, but most Manipulation sets have these benchmarks (with minor variation in placement). They average about three melee attacks per set with about half of those containing both damage and control elements. About one in three sets also has a ranged damage attack. They have about four CC attacks per set (one of those is generally a T1 Immobilize) and about half of those attacks has a damage element. Sets have one to three utility powers that are either self buffs, enemy debuffs, or a click heal. Endurance and recharge are the most common self buff utility elements. I hope that helps with the definition of what a manipulation set is. That means that the combination will generally have about 6 melee with 2-3 of those being AoE and 1-2 including control, 4-5 ranged with 1-2 being AoE and 1-2 including control, 2 boosts, 2-5 utility powers, and one sustain, usually providing either healing or absorb. By adding the chance to placate, it plays to the intractability of the AT while using an existing mechanic.

I actually do not like the concept of the holy trinity, it is just one lens to see things through. If you expand it out you have multiple roles: information gathering, movement CC, attack mitigation CC, buff, debuff, heal, aggro-based herding, aggro-based mitigation, position-based mitigation, melee single target dps, melee multi-target dps, ranged single target dps, ranged multi-target dps, melee single target burst damage, melee multi-target burst damage, ranged single target burst damage, ranged multi-target burst damage, and probably some others I can't remember atm. D&D is another simplified lens, and each class had multiple roles. CoH has basically five game modes: solo normal content, team normal content, solo high-end content, team high-end content, and PvP. Now, what the specific roles you choose to play do not matter much for solo and team normal content. For high-end content, CC is often out the window and you want to make sure you have sufficient coverage of all the roles, but you do not necessarily have to have specific ATs doing specific jobs. PvP content I will not comment on, because I basically don't care about it, so I couldn't give you a meaningful analysis of the needs of a PvP team. That being said, 40% of the game requires each AT to be sufficiently self-sufficient, 80% of the game requires that each AT have sufficient versatility to address at least four of the above-stated seventeen roles, and the other 20% I couldn't tell you about (but my guess is that it is similar to team high-end content except that aggro-based mitigation and herding become a lot less important and position-based mitigation and CC-based herding become more important).

There are basically three roles in RPGs: Support, Tank, and DPS. CoH has: Support: Controller Defender Dominator Mastermind* (pretty close to DPS) Tank: Brute Sentinel* (pretty close to DPS) Tanker DPS: Blaster Corruptor Scrapper* (pretty close to tank) Stalker There are currently fewer Tank ATs than the other two. Tanks have two roles, damage absorption and herding. Tankers and Brutes are more focused on aggro management, whereas Sentinel is more focused on damage absorption. The current proposal would involve another damage absorption model that is significantly different from current ATs. Now, Kimuji, I understand where you are coming from, but I would argue that you are only perceiving this from a limited perspective, focusing on one specific playstyle and one specific narrow definition of roles. CoH simply is not that game. If you are worried about ranged tanks being unable to herd, that is because it is not their role. Just as it is not the role of a Stalker to stand in the fray with scrapperlock and be semi-tankish. Each AT fits a specified role while also overflowing to the other two roles to greater or lesser extent. This means that no specific AT has a specific job, they all can work together to improve each other while defining their own role and playing to their strengths. But this game will never be as simple and narrow as some other RPGs are, and that is why it exists despite the odds. Is Instigator T2 a good new AT? yes. Is it my favorite? no. But would I endorse it if it won the great AT battle and became the players choice for implementation? Definitely.

Also, as a point of clarification, the strong similarities between certain current ATs was intentional. When there was a wall between CoH and CoV you could not play a Tanker on redside or a Brute on blueside. That meant that their core mechanics could be quite similar without any conflict. The feeling of redundancy is, in part, because of these similarities. Redside ATs were introduced after blueside, which is why they are often better designed than the originals. That being said, CoH has become a game of nuanced differences, and I would agree that this set fills a nuanced niche that is separate from Tankers, Brutes, and Sentinels.

Hey... Zoomer (19.07.25.22.56.xx) Manipulation/Assault Zoom: Personal +SPD for ranged, enemy -SPD for melee, and increased speed cap. Zoomers offer the feel of playing a speedster while providing access to two AT-specific power sets that are versatile an fun. I actually proposed a way to make Manipulation work as a primary... That being said, Manipulation would not be a good choice for what you are trying to do with this AT proposal. I like your decision to go straight armor, it is likely a better choice than your take one proposal, but don't be dissing Manipulation... (that being said, I will not be bringing up manipulation on this thread again (I hope)...)