ShardWarrior

It would be nice to see this data for here. Back in the day I think most people were turned off by the absurd prices in the AH for IOs, so it stands to reason most did not use it. Homecoming here is much different in that regard. Again, just anecdotal to me personally - I see more characters with IO set bonuses listed in their info than not. We have no way of knowing for certain without seeing the numbers.

Are most people keeping level 25 common IOs though? I would be curious to see the data here. Again, just my own experience here with myself and others I team with but we are swapping those out for higher level IOs or IO sets as we can.

Yes I know as I did clarify at level 50. I wonder if it is possible to pull the data to see how many characters at 50 are still using SOs vs IOs?

Apologies as I should have clarified that I did not mean people who are purpled out or loaded up on all kinds of IO set bonuses, just common IOs. From my own anecdotal personal experience, most people are at least slotting common IOs as they get them because they level with you. As I recall, an even level IO is still ~10 to 12% better than a +3 SO at level 50, but do not quote me on that.

I agree and would add more content designed for and balanced around IOs and incarnates instead of just SOs.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with what you are saying here as it is a preference of yours. This is how you choose to play and have fun, so more power to you. You can already play all the content you like without incarnates, you just need to put in the effort to build your teams.

While I can understand and appreciate this point of view, it demonstrates a clear lack of understanding of how others view their hobby or past time. There are a great many people across all walks of life who have a passion for something, be it starting a business or following a favorite sports team or whatever. Those people are not spending their time and effort doing what they do because they see it as a chore or a job. It is an activity they enjoy doing and expecting them to treat it otherwise is absurd.

You are ignoring the lore and story content itself with regard to incarnates. Replay the final mission of the Mender Ramiel arc again and pay close attention to the final cut scene were he and Silos are referring to those touched by the well as "god-like beings". Your character is on that same path. I will repeat it yet again, Incarnates being powerful is not the problem The problem is the lack of content designed for and balanced around them is. Allowing incarnates to be used outside of DA and iTrials can be an issue for some as well, but that can easily be solved by forming a team appropriately or simply never crafting and slotting incarnate powers on characters and running the content how you like. I suppose so long as the team leader would advertise ahead of time, but that can be done now. And again, how difficult is it to not click an incarnate power button?

Low population is not something anyone has control over and if anything is an even better reason why people make solo capable characters. If you are getting a lot of tells and requests from others to for teams, I do not understand why you are saying it is difficult to find others who play as you do. Something does not jive there. There are jerks everywhere and they are very easily avoided. Again, if you are on a team that is not playing the way you like, leave the team and go find another one. Coding a "no incarnate" toggle is not necessary. You can already form a team of non-incarnates or request no one with them use them or un-slot them.

No offense meant, but this sounds like you are trying to make excuses. I play the overwhelming majority of the time on Torchbearer and I see non-speed TFs and mission teams being advertised many times daily. I am sure you would have no problem filling teams for how you want to play. You just need to ask. Well no, it has nothing to do with showing off. It has to do with people doing what they do in MMOs - being sociable and playing together because they want to. The people I team with regularly are real life family and friends and others who are like minded in play style. This is what we find fun and we are enjoying our game time together. To imply that myself and other with similar tastes are trying to somehow make others feel bad or inferior is so far off base, it truly the mind and says a whole lot more about you than them. If others are making you feel inferior, then do not team with them. Find others who play like you do. It is not like it is a difficult thing to do.

Except this is not entirely true and is more often than not a self inflicted issue. There is absolutely nothing preventing anyone such as yourself from using the available social tools both in game and out to find like minded players to team up with. Nothing is stopping you or anyone from advertising to form non-speed, no incarnate powers missions or TFs and the like in game. I know there are quite a few people who feel the same way from posts I have seen on these forums. What is stopping you from linking up in game, forming your own teams and playing how you all enjoy? This door absolutely swings both ways. Those who have invested a lot of time into building their characters the way they like to be as powerful as they like because that is what they find fun should not have to dumb down their experience to satisfy others. What I said above applies here too. Those people have plenty of channels to find like minded players who enjoy playing that way and they do find others to team with.

According to some, no. There are several posts on these forums decrying how incarnates ruined the game because everyone is too powerful or how Judgement needs to be removed completely.

Posting this graph without the rest of the data and follow up discussion is disingenuous. What I said was not inaccurate nor is it cherry picking or moving goalposts. It is discussing the metrics and the whole picture accurately. Or are you suggesting that every player is essentially playing nothing but Fire/Spines Brutes for all non-AE content?

STO has it as well. May modern MMOs have it and it is a blessing in my opinion.

Exactly

That graph is nice, but what happens when you remove Brutes who are AE farming? What does it look like then?

This does not explain the variety of ATs and power sets being created and played though. Were this absolutely true, we would see nothing but tanks, brutes and scrappers and no one would team for anything. Reality and posted metrics say otherwise. Given the lack of incarnate level content, are you surprised by this?

This is spot on. Here is a thing most people who cry for balance and nerfs seem to always neglect - the game could get balanced and homogenized to the point of every AT and power set doing the exact same damage numbers and there will still be players who are just better than you and will out-perform you every time. I cannot agree more that content with varying levels of difficulty is simply the better option.

Calling a scrapper who can handle more than 3 targets "a problem" is a gross exaggeration. Again, every AT should be able to handle at least 3 targets at once. If we are going to start nerfing down everything so the "holy trinity" is required for every bit of content, I think you will see this game die very, very fast. I have said this many times before - the levels of power players can achieve, especially with incarnates, is not the problem. The problem is there is little to no content that is designed for and balanced around high-performing builds and teams in mind. Making end management a non-issue does not require a "buttload of variables", simply proper slotting and selective power choices. Visit the various build forums. Plenty of good options there.

This is sound advice. Recipes and even most crafted IOs are not super expensive either. With that said, I would love to see an account bank accessible to all characters on an account.

Were this true, we would be seeing far less variety in ATs and power picks. Posted metrics and my own personal experience show differently. While true for some, this is not universally true for everyone. There were back in the day and are today a great many support class players who enjoy being able to shift their focus toward more offense instead of pure defense later in the game. That is also "new content" for them. There is also nothing stopping anyone from socializing to find like minded players with whom to team up with and enjoy all the content the way you all like. This is one of the great beauties of this game in that it caters to a very wide array of players. That is a very good thing in my opinion. If we are to be nerfed down to the point where we absolutely require others to help us cross the street all for the sake of "balance", I think it detracts from the superhero theme.

Fighting only 1 to 3 things at a time is most definitely not my idea of scrapping. 😁 Any AT should easily be able to handle 1 to3 targets. You are still much, much more reliant on clicks for survival with Regen versus something like SR or Shield, so to categorize it as "hands off" is misleading I think. Granted QR can be nice at early levels, however once you get into IOs and Incarnates, endurance management becomes a non issue depending on power picks and IO slotting.

Given that most of the healing in Scrapper Regen comes from click heals, I am curious how you are defining "hands off"?

This is my experience as well and would say Kinetic Melee suffers the same due to animation length. TW is definitely not on the list of choices for me on speed TFs or iTrials. Far from it in fact. To be honest, I do not think I have ever seen a TW scrapper or Brute on a TF or iTrial recently. From my experience, they are an outlier and nowhere near as common as SS or StrJ.

Spot on and hence why many have said for a long time, Incarnates being powerful is not the problem. There is little to no content designed specifically for and balanced around them is.