megaericzero

Here's (yet) another set I've been kicking around for a while: Polearm This one is largely for theme/aesthetics but thought and care was put into giving it a particular feel. Leogunner and AspieAnarchy have suggested scythe and spear power sets before, respectively. I'd like to do my own take with a more generic set that covers both. Functionally, it's a lethal alternative to staff. Sort of the Battle Axe to Staff's War Mace, though very different in powers. This set might require its own custom animations, making the entire idea a non-starter, but we'll try recycling animations instead. I feel the set's animations should focus on a solid stance and simpler, more impactful strikes that leverage the tool's bladed end. Thematically, a sort of midway between Staff Fighting and Titan Weapons - slower, less flashy, and more impactful swings than staff but still fluid, agile, and mobile compared to titan. Here's the power table: Polearm You wield a polearm - a regal trident, a powerful scythe, or a trusty spear. Attacks from the weapon will puncture armor and skin, causing extra bleeding damage over time. Pierce (Melee) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal, ignores resistance), Minor DOT (Lethal) Rend (Melee) Foe High Damage (Lethal), -Resistance (All), Minor DOT (Lethal) Carve (Melee Cone) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal), Minor DOT (Lethal) Hone Blade Self +Damage, +Accuracy, +Special Crescent Slash (PBAOE) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal), Chance to Knockdown, Minor DOT (Lethal) Confront (Ranged) Foe Taunt, -Range Guillotine (Melee) Foe Superior Damage (Smashing, Lethal), Disorient, Minor DOT (Lethal) Javelin (Narrow Ranged Cone) Foe High Damage (Lethal), Knockdown, Minor DOT (Lethal) Plunge (Ranged) Foe Extreme Damage (Lethal), Immobilize, Minor DOT (Lethal); Self Teleport The table is for Scrappers. Brutes, of course, swap Confront for Taunt; Tankers swap Taunt and Hone Blade's tiers; Stalkers drop the PBAOE for Assassin's Strike at tier 4, Hone Blade becomes generic Build Up at tier 5, and Confront becomes Placate at tier 6 with all other powers shifting down as necessary. I'd love to let Stalkers keep Hone Blade instead but it seems all Stalker sets give up their special Build Ups. And here's the detailed power info: Pierce (Melee) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal, ignores resistance), Minor DOT (Lethal) You thrust your weapon at a foe to puncture through any armor they may have. The damage done by this attack ignores most types of damage resistance. Damage: Moderate Recharge: Fast Suggested animation: a poke; do the Cimerorans have something like that we can use? Rend (Melee) Foe High Damage (Lethal), -Resistance (All), Minor DOT (Lethal) You strike at a foe using your weapon's leverage to cleave through or pop off armor, dealing high damage and lowering their damage resistance for a time. Damage: High Recharge: Moderate Suggested animation: an upward swing like Katana > Soaring Dragon Carve (Melee Cone) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal), Minor DOT (Lethal) Slice at all foes in a large cone in front of you, dealing moderate damage and causing them to bleed for additional lethal damage over time. Damage: Moderate Recharge: Moderate Suggested animation: the wide, back-handed weapon swing (ex: Broad Sword > Slice) Hone Blade Self +Damage, +Accuracy, +Special Straightens your weapon's blade, greatly increasing your damage and chance to hit for a short time. Additionally, your bleed damage will ignore most types of damage resistance during this period. Recharge: Long Suggested animation: generic build up Crescent Slash (PBAOE) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal), Chance to Knockdown, Minor DOT (Lethal) You lash at all foes around you with one large swing, dealing moderate damage and possibly knocking them off their feet. Damage: Moderate Recharge: Slow Suggested animation: same as Whirling Smash Guillotine (Melee) Foe Superior Damage (Smashing, Lethal), Disorient, Minor DOT (Lethal) You bring your weapon straight down with full force on a single foe, dealing superior damage and stunning them in the process. Damage: Superior Recharge: Slow Suggested animation: I want to say Titan Weapons also had a two-handed, overhead, downward swing Javelin (Narrow Ranged Cone) Foe High Damage (Lethal), Knockdown, Minor DOT (Lethal) You launch your polearm with incredible force, dealing damage and knocking down both your intended target and anyone unfortunate enough to be in your weapon's flight path. Damage: High Recharge: Slow Suggested animation: the Cimeroran spear-tossing animation (Pulim I think it's called?) Personally, I am wholly unconcerned with "you threw your weapon, now you have to go grab it" for multiple reasons. I don't find it immersion-breaking, in fact that level of immersion grates on me, there are plenty of characters in fiction with ways to recall their weapons (magic, tech, or otherwise), characters could wield multiple weapons and throw a different one than the one they're using or switch to a duplicate if they're using disposables, and the next power (Plunge) is an easy write-off as well for "you jumped to your weapon and grabbed it out of the person it embedded into." Plunge (Ranged) Foe Extreme Damage (Lethal), Immobilize, Minor DOT (Lethal); Self Teleport You dive directly at a targeted foe and plunge your weapon into them on impact. This attack deals extreme damage to your target, closes even large gaps between you and them, and pins them in place. Damage: Extreme Recharge: Slow Suggested animation: something like Shield Defense > Shield Charge or even Ninja Blade > Assassin's Blade's fast animation (but, of course, you teleport during it) -- This set has a few gimmicks going for it. The ubiquitous secondary effect is lethal damage over time. Both the tier 1 power and the "bleed" damage (when using the set's Build Up equivalent) have damage that partially ignores normal lethal resistance, which is my attempt at raising their damage floor and average damage (as the character gets higher in level) without raising their damage ceiling. Hopefully that would be useful as the character progresses through the game and comes across more and more enemies that resist lethal. I don't think it would be too problematic as it's effectively raising damage by normalizing it; mobs that are meant to be truly invulnerable for story beats and other gimmicks are already labeled with things like untouchable or intangible, plus the ignore-resistance is all on minor damage effects. Javelin is like a hybrid between other melee sets' ranged attacks (Focus, Hurl Boulder) and ranged cones (Throw Spines, Shockwave). In a way, it's also loosely related to many weapon sets' tier 8/9 narrow-cone, though having traded raw power to be ranged instead of melee but that's more of a stretch. Speaking of the tier 9, it's a teleport attack. Dunno what other people think of these but I am cool with them becoming more common, especially to make sets feel "zippier" by allowing characters to dive at their next victim or use as an alpha strike when engaging enemies. -- For weapon customization, in addition to the existing blade-tipped staff options, we could have: Staff's tech staff and trident Additional spear options (tribal, knife-tied-to-a-stick, elemental staves, etc.) A couple of scythe options (plain, decorated, Halloween) Medieval pole-axe Whatever you call that symmetrical, double-bladed tool wielded by Thanos in Endgame and Groh in Soulcalibur Perhaps elongated Arachnos maces And... that's about it. I'm (still) bad at outro-ing my own suggestions. 👍

Glad to be of inspiration! 😛

Wanted to toss this one out: Thrown Weapons for characters who toss disposable blades or other things. Ideally, the set would allow power customization options like darts, shurikens, sawblades, knives/daggers, even short swords, and more. All-in-all, I think the set would function as the blast-version of Claws. Its powers do lethal damage and most have no secondary effects but compensates with fast animations and short recharge times the same as Claws. Throw Dart (Ranged) Foe Minor Damage (Lethal); [Special] Sleep Throw Blade (Ranged) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal) Flechettes (Ranged Cone) Foe Moderate Damage-over-Time (Lethal) Envenomed Blades Self +To Hit, +Special (Toxic damage to all attacks) Bullseye (Snipe) Foe Superior Damage (Lethal) Trickshot (Ranged Chain) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal) Hammer Toss (Ranged) Foe High Damage (Smashing), -Defense, -Fly Explosive Blade (Ranged AOE) Foe Moderate Damage (Lethal) Storm of Blades (Location AOE) Foe Superior Damage-over-Time (Smashing, Lethal), -Movement, -Fly As far as the unique powers go: Throw Dart (Ranged) Foe Minor Damage (Lethal); [Special] Sleep A small, fast projectile that deals light damage with the puncture wound it creates. When you envenom your blades, your darts will be coated in a poison that can put weaker foes to sleep. Damage: Minor Recharge: Very Fast (Uses the overhand throw animation.) Flechettes (Ranged Cone) Foe Moderate Damage-over-Time (Lethal) Throws a handful of small, sharp objects in a cone in front of you, dealing moderate damage over time as foes are cut to shreds and start to bleed. Damage: Moderate Recharge: Slow (Uses the wide, backhand swing that Broad Sword > Slice does.) Hammer Toss (Ranged) Foe High Damage (Smashing), -Defense, -Fly Strike a foe with a heavy projectile, dealing high smashing damage as well as reducing the targeted foe's defense. Flying foes will also be knocked out of the air. Damage: High Recharge: Moderate(Uses one of the whip animations without the whip VFX.) Storm of Blades (Location AOE) Foe Superior Damage-over-Time (Smashing, Lethal), -Movement, -Fly Sends a barrage of thrown weapons at a targeted location. Any foes caught in the area will suffer superior damage over time as they are battered by the sheer number of weapons striking them. Enemy movement will also be slowed as the strewn weapons create obstacles and flying enemies will even be knocked out of the air. Damage: Superior Recharge: Slow (I want to say there's an animation in-game of throwing a bunch of stuff into the air. Otherwise something like Flurry/Shadow Maul's animation with blades landing at the targeted area like Rain of Arrows.) -- Side note: The power name is referring to this type of hammer toss but glad I could inspire @Rudra to want to make a koopa character. (I'm not against a power customization option to just throw a construction hammer as well.)

The HC devs stated they don't want to do that kind of power choice again.

You find a worn slab of stone in Grendel's Gulch with etchings intentionally scratched into its surface: "GOLAPO OOG? Y / N" You get the feeling you should just put it back down...

Ah, understandable. I appreciate the feedback. Support sets are less patterned than other categories so it's harder for me to get a feel for over/underdoing it. In the particular case of the tier 1 power, it's a blatant clone of Force Bolt / Repulsion Bomb that switches based on the set's gimmick. If it's too underwhelming, it can easily be junked for a new power. EDIT: Good point. I'm a bit apprehensive of giving a control set a hard control as its ubiquitous secondary effect instead of a debuff. Should it be a short-lived disorient?

What does a standard support set layout look like?

That's more than fair. The reason I suggested both sets is that there's still room for "pure" energy character concepts separate from electricity, fire, or kinetics. Radiation, visually, is a good representative but I think, conceptually, there is still plenty of room for baseline energy to set itself apart from rad's focus on themes of sickness and degradation. Mechanically, the sets - while largely hodgepodge - try to do something to stand out. Energy Control is more focused on damage than actual control; Energy Affinity is meant to be an endurance-protecting beast as opposed to endurance debuffing/draining that elec sets are known for.

Very much so, especially in COH. Radiation and Electricity sets both do energy damage while the "pure" energy sets actually do mixed smashing-energy. Force Field, Gravity, and Kinetics also fall under energy conceptually. Thermal too, in terms of physics.

I'd like to throw out another power set suite - this time for energy. (Pure energy as opposed to kinetics, gravity, force field, and radiation - which I would say are categorically related and often mixed-and-matched with one another but can still be thematically distinct a good chunk of the time.) As with the thread on the water power set suite, this would be so that we can flesh out [remaining] power sets for a specific theme alongside one another so that each set's power names and themes can be given a specific theme or, at least, not step on each other's toes. Energy already has great coverage and is represented in: Blast Manipulation Melee Armor Assault Ancillary (counting Force and Body as Energy) ... with a few proliferation exceptions (Tankers for EA, Sentinels for a mastery). This leaves us with two categories left: Control Affinity With that in mind, here are the sets I'd like to suggest. I'll put annotations in this faded font color. ENERGY CONTROL You are able to control the flow of energy around you to manipulate your foes. Condensing, expelling, even outright redirecting movement or stopping it in its tracks. Most attacks deal smashing and energy damage concurrently, and many will leave your foes with inhibited damage potential. This set is a mashup of Gravity Control and Electric Control with a focus on dealing damage rather than keeping things perpetually locked-down. Its shared secondary effect for all attack powers is a damage debuff. Photon Bombardment (Ranged) Foe Minor Damage over Time (Energy), Immobilize, -Movement, -Damage Force Lift (Ranged) Foe Moderate Damage (Smashing, Energy), Knockup, -Damage Zero-Point Energy (Ranged) Foe Moderate Damage-over-Time (Smashing, Energy), Hold, -Damage Reflecting Blast (Ranged Chain) Foe Minor Damage (Smashing, Energy), Knockdown, -Damage Obstruction Field (Ranged Cone) Foe Minor Damage-over-Time (Smashing, Energy), Immobilize, -Damage Concussive Burst (PBAOE) Foe Moderate Damage (Smashing, Energy), Knockback, Disorient, -Damage Energy Vacuum (Ranged AOE) Foe Hold, -Damage Quantum Entanglement Toggle] (PBAOE) Foe Chance for Minor Energy Damage (Special); Self Heal (Special - per foe) Entropic Force (Location) Summon Pet (Living Entropy) I'm wrapping the detailed power info in spoiler boxes so the post isn't gigantic. ENERGY AFFINITY You are able to control and emit energy to aid your allies and weaken your enemies. This set is also a mixed bag. In this case, it's a hodgepodge of effects from Force Field and Empathy with its own spin. Its standout buff area is team endurance - specifically keeping it up and aggressively trying to counter enemies like Sappers. Energy Bolt (Ranged - Special) Foe Minor Damage (Smashing, Energy), Knockback/Knockdown (Special), Disorient (Special); Self Consume (Potential Energy) Energy Boost (Ranged - Special) Ally Heal, +Endurance, +Resistance (Endurance Drain); Self Consume (Potential Energy) Energy Repulsion [Toggle] (PBAOE) Foe Repel, Chance to Knockback; Self -End (per foe) Power Down (Ranged Cone) Foe -Damage, -Endurance, -Recovery; Self Build (Potential Energy - per foe) Reduce Entropy (Ranged) Ally +Protection (Confuse, Disorient, Fear, Hold, Immobilize, Sleep), +Perception, +Resistance (Endurance Drain) Energy Dispersion [Toggle] (PBAOE) Ally/Self +Defense (Smashing, Lethal), +Resistance (Heat, Cold, Energy,Negative, Toxic, Psionic, Endurance Drain), +Protection (Disorient, Hold, Immobilize) Restore Power (Ranged - Special) Ally Resurrect (Special), +Protection (XP Debt), +Regeneration (Special); Self Consume (Potential Energy) Perpetual Motion (PBAOE) Ally/Self +Endurance Discount, +Recharge, +Resistance(Endurance Drain, Recharge) Maximum Power (Ranged) Ally +Damage, +Tohit, +Special, +Range ... and that about wraps it up. What are your guys' thoughts?

Perhaps alternatively changing its icon slightly when NoPhase is still enforced? With the update to Rise of the Phoenix, its button shifts fluidly to and from Inferno's when it becomes usable while alive; maybe swapping Hibernate's icon to an alternate version that has a 🚫 overlaid when NoPhase would hinder it? (Suggesting this as I read the colored rings as denoting a power's non-default state.)

Does /release_pets not force them to self-defeat in that situation?

What Overkill said - there's the underling rank; it just gets used sparingly. I could see incorporating additional underling versions of minions into special encounters on top of whatever's already regularly there to make them feel more horde-like.

Definitely yes to more factions for the lore pets, please. It's a great way to cope pretend substitute being a mastermind or high-ranking member/affiliate of an in-game faction.

Eyy, I remember Prima guides! I had the one that said "updated for Issue 1: Through the Looking Glass." The Tsoo takes up a good chunk of the enemies section... and the whole book. .__.

As does Gather Shadows, which snarky mentioned.

It's just my perception but Fighting is a tier (haha) above what Medicine and Presence get - it's the one I see get threads made more often, and with more people who don't hang out in S&I going out of their way to post about it, with a lot more unanimous clamoring for replacement/removal of both powers or the entry cost, yet with big, sweeping changes that go in a million different directions. Compared to that, I see less threads about Medicine or Presence and usually just number tweaks - remove interrupt time (Medicine), increase potency, increase range, increase area of effect, increase accuracy/autohit (Pacify/Provoke), or shuffle some of the power tiers around. There will always be calls for more power even if they got all of that. The issue is that melee attacks in pools, bar Air Superiority, are all pretty dead on arrival but any other pool has an alternative utility power to pick - Combat Jumping, Hasten, and Hover - while Boxing and Kick are redundant flavors of lousy. Don't get me wrong - the power tax should stay and I'll gladly pay it for Tough and Weave but, personally, Boxing and Kick are the only powers I will take yet actively remove from my tray. I'll put in a stray Pacify or Weaken Resolve during combat, or keep Grant Invisibility or Injection for teaming. Fighting Synergy is either terrible lip service or terrible sunk cost fallacy (or both) packaged as a buff. -- That said, I don't feel strongly about it overall. As I mentioned, I'll gladly take the power tax if it means Tough and Weave, and throw Boxing or Kick into the trash. I do agree, though, with people that feel Boxing and Kick - specifically Boxing and Kick - are pure tax while other pools at least let you pick a neat little cantrip in their prereqs if not something you actually want.

Just throwing out a random idea: maybe taking inspiration from Pokemon's Technician ability, which boosts the damage of attacks under a certain threshold? For instance, replacing Kick with an auto power that buffs the damage of melee attacks in the "minor" to "moderate" range. This would technically achieve what you're suggesting and also have some of that sweet accidental synergy with Parry/Divine Avalanche. Claws would become insane, though, so probably not; Bill Z Bubba would become [even more] unstoppable.

This is going to be wildly off-topic but... Personally, I prefer synergies that happen by chance rather than by design (or, at least, seem to be). I hold the Oil Slick Arrow + Howling Twilight mass rez back when Hami was being redesigned as the pinnacle example of pure genius in this regard. (Feel free to respond "but muh immersion!") Or in other videogames/TCGs where a card buffs some vague trait and a random card from a different box set has that trait for thematic reasons so gets the buff. Or how cast iron is compatible with induction cooking even though the former is "old world" and the latter is "cutting edge." Even just picking thematically-unmatched power sets to compliment each other, like having double damage auras via Spines or double consume with Dark Melee. -- Anyway, back on topic: Even without travel pools, the others' prereqs feel actually good out-of-the-box. Leadership: defense buff aura or damage buff aura that benefit the caster Medicine: ally heal or clear mind (which I didn't even realize was also made into a potential enemy debuff?) Presence: raise threat or lower threat - even if you just want Unrelenting, throwing out a random Pacify still has concrete utility compared to throwing out a random Boxing or Kick Concealment (before being considered a travel pool with the change to Infiltration): worse invis but can attack or give someone else stealth

It's not a radical assumption. The escaped prisoners hanging around in Brickstown only have a rock and pipe/knife/brawl as attacks. Not even a handgun until lieutenant rank, let alone any superhuman abilities - natural or otherwise. 😛

I would push back on the assertion about Air Superiority, specifically. It is a guaranteed knockdown attempt* on a baseline 4 second cooldown. In the low levels, when you're playing +0/x1 - where mobs are usually only 2 or 3 foes - it is effectively a permanent "sit the [heck] down" power on one of the enemies. * I say "guaranteed attempt" because it's 100% chance to occur but can still be resisted by mobs, as opposed to other powers that have a chance not to do their CC effect Granted, it's in a set whose main draw (Fly) no longer has a prerequisite cost and whose alternative prereq was already great (Hover). On the whole, I agree Boxing/Kick could do to feel like a better pick while remaining a prereq for Tough (and, by extension, Weave) without having to dip into the synergy. Don't count my boy Air Superiority out, though.

If I had to guess, Grandville wasn't done yet since it was a big marquee addition for Issue 7 (the issue after COV's release). Paragonwiki lists that Issue 1: Through the Looking Glass (which added Peregrine Island and the Rikti Crash Site) raised the hero level cap from 40 to 50 as well.

Ranged damage was lacking before origin pools but those have since added them. Presence's fear, placate, and (technically) taunt are forms of control. Air Superiority is also an incredible constant knockdown, especially good for low-level characters. EDIT: 3. double-up on your strengths - eg: Taunts on a tank, melee attacks on a scrapper, etc.

Weren't veteran levels already a reward for continuing to play the characters? Back on live, 50 was it. Veteran Levels come with both bragging rights and rewards up to 100 - badges, costume tokens, respec tokens, empyrians, and threads.

If I had to guess, the game's spaghetti probably ties going to idle with sheathing all weaponry and, for some reason, it was more feasible to tag all the shield powers as "never go idle" than it was to tag the shield costume part as "stay visible even when idle if any of your toggles are still active." That's purely speculation, though, so don't quote me.