megaericzero

We definitely talked about it in a thread several months ago. Dunno who else might've brought it up. Shoulder makes sense. Wrist in this case, though - that's the snag here. Any of the tech options and many other large gauntlets fit fine just adding muzzle flares to the hands. Same with the claws suggestion in the OP - the pirate hooks are perfectly fine stand-ins for claws. It's coming up with a list of (ultimately arbitrary) gloves options that work for non-weapon weapons - AR, claws, or otherwise - or any other convoluted workaround that'll be troublesome.

Gonna throw this out there again just to tease: Monster Hunter had a no-model dual blades option specifically so your character looks like they're doing crazy bare-handed combat. 😜 Now as a serious response: a suggestion that comes back up from time to time - and popped up again recently in a thread but I forget which - is giving assault rifle a no-weapon option that comes from your wrists since hi-tech/power armor and exotic/cyborg weapons exist.

Very much these. Also tooltips listing both mez protection and mez resistance as resistance.

The God of War screenshot was just the first one that popped out to me to send as an example. I believe that type of camera is usually referred to as over-the-shoulder? It's prominent in modern third-person shooters. (Dunno that I'd use it myself but +1 to the request; it's a solid viewport choice.)

I think nzer is asking for the ability to shift the camera so your character is to one side of the screen. eg: (just grabbing the first screenshot I find on google)

This is reminding me of the time back on live where dedicated teams complained monsters were too easy so the devs put another zero at the end of the monster base regen value and the regular folk couldn't beat them anymore so they reverted it. Your suggestion isn't so intense but if it's aimed at the people who say things are too easy then do something to meet them closer to their ceiling instead of raising the floor on everyone.

Insert SCR here but I would assume all NPCs spawn with stats based on their rank from a generic table before any powers come into play, whereas adding Fitness to them all - even as one power - would require appending it to each and every creature. (I'm assuming based on the fact that the wikis list NPCs' resistances as well as other flavored passive abilities like flight or self-immobilization as an auto power in their profile instead of those just being intrinsic aspects of their existences, though I suppose a good majority of those profiles were written before Surveillance was a thing.)

Very much in support of this. Perhaps also alternate vfx to add coverage for overlapping themes and effects - such as energy blast having alternates for force field and kinetics in place of the molecular look since all three are energy-related and generally do knockback anyway.

Just curious: why not just boost the respective stats instead? Fitness is all auto powers, NPCs can't enhance themselves, and I'm guessing non-combat NPCs can't have powers anyway so a chunk of escorts wouldn't even benefit from it.

On a more serious note: no desire to name the set Rifle Assault since it's (I assume) the thematic-relative to the Assault Rifle blast set? Not that there's anything wrong with the set name and I'm guessing it's meant to line-up with Arsenal Control in the set listing.

Thank you guys for consolidating the names of thematically-matched ancillary pools across the archetypes!

Yeah I don't... I don't think we're mature enough to call a power Buttstroke instead of Rifle Butt. In a powerset that can be abbreviated to Arse Assault, no less. 😂

To reiterate what others already said: there's less villain content and heroes are more convenient. If you ask me, the two big areas for that would be maps and contacts/storyarcs. Blueside has more maps that cater to a wider range of aesthetics and offer alternative choices at multiple level ranges. Even if multiple zones went unused or underexplored (largely the older hazard zones), they offer alternative vistas that feel visually-immersed in their motif. Redside is a string of island slums with a gimmick-aesthetic that's only even tacked onto a section of each map, compounded by a fairly strict linear progression from one zone to the next. Ease of traversing is also important. The grid-like layout, clear, wide, open streets, and less need for Fly/SJ/TP make for a better experience getting from A to B even if blueside sends you from zone to zone between missions. While the aesthetic of inconvenience contributes to the theming of redside, actually being inconvenient is mentally-taxing. Contact progression blueside is also more fluid as your existing contacts offer you a choice of who to send you to next, sometimes multiple times, as you work through their missions and arcs. This lets you bounce around where you want as opposed to redside's patterned newspapers-A-B pattern that resets in every zone. As for storyarcs (or missions in general), it's easier to write for heroes than villains. Heroes will do the good thing at the end of the day regardless of what the contact says, because it's the right thing to do. Villains have varied motivations and would want to have their specific motivation stroked (or at least not contradicted) - big money payout, the chance to cut loose, spreading their ideology, etc. It would be nice for each alt to be able to progress on a path that feels at least partly suited to a specific villainous drive or only a small set of them instead of being the every-villain that's sometimes an obedient lackey, sometimes cartoonishly money-grubbing, sometimes insatiably murderous, etc. In terms of solutions, gating features from blueside or giving material rewards to redside (boosted inf/exp/drops) are not the way to go. Dangling a carrot may lure people in but only begrudgingly. Make it a place people actually want to be instead. That's my take, at least. There are other, minor details like villain enemy groups generally having less models - making them feel more bland - or just being existing COH groups +1 new enemy type, difficulty being slightly higher going from blue to red, lack of a gathering hub equivalent to Atlas Plaza, etc. but the above are the big two.

Personally, I think the benefits of badges (accolade powers, earning Vanguard merits, the Ouroboros portal power, Midnighter Club access, etc.) should be account-wide. Aside from accolades, they're all seemingly just a checkbox that you did the tutorial for the thing they're gating anyway. (If anyone wants more of my reasonining, I'm glad to explain myself; I get that this is a crazy opinion in the first place.) By all means, still make each character earn the badge itself for bragging rights. I wouldn't support selling them for the RMT reason, though, so no to the actual OP suggestion.

I've always wondered that myself, in a broader sense - why do games (that receive updates) keep unused or retired files that they're extremely unlikely to ever put [back] into the game? I'm guessing it's something to do with the nature of computer memory or programming dependencies. Not complaining, though; Galaxy City was my starting home more often than not on blueside and I like to visit occasionally.

If memory serves, BABs back on the live forums mentioned that the engine couldn't mix animations like that, hence why they always have to create a flight-alternate of any power animations.

Gotta love fighting an EB/AV and they decide now is the time for their morning jog at full Super Speed.

The default keybinds have Z set to do that. (If memory serves.) In fact there are two commands: one that cancels your next queued attack only (/powexec_unqueue?), and one that cancels both your next queued attack as well as clearing whatever auto-fire power you have set (/powexec_abort?). The default bind is the latter. Personally, I have Z set to just the cancel-next-queued-only command and relegated the clear-both to CTRL+Z instead. As for the OP: no strong feelings. As an option I suppose? That way it doesn't interrupt jousting, as lemming said.

The idea was actually, yes, to give squishies an option for protection to the main three mezzes that all melee get protection from (hold, sleep, stun) specifically because they don't have a toggle-able option outside of FF and sonic's bubbles. In my own head, it was low magnitude only sufficient for one mez (mag 3?) and I figured the cost of having to go three powers deep into a specific pool would be a good enough balancing factor. Doubly so if we remove the hold protection so that they have to take Acrobatics. (It's annoying that power tooltips list both protection and resistance as just resistance.) If a dedicated mez protection toggle is still too good for the ranged archetypes, perhaps going with a previous idea I had to turn it into a pseudo-break free might work? Having it be insanely high mez resistance so it basically instantly ends all mez of those types on the character but only last for a single second and on a very long cooldown. The problem I see with that, though, is the resistance can't discriminate by magnitude so it would be able to shrug off some ridiculously large magnitudes of holds that even tankers would be jealous of.

Oh geez. I'm more out of touch than I thought. Thanks for updating me! 👍

The idea for Advanced Investigation was just more damage to destructible objects and faster glowie progress - basically complete object-oriented objectives slightly faster. Less damage (or even less push) from object explosions could be a thing; it can be really annoying to destroy a person-sized item and be sent flying from Cap au Diable to Peregrine Island because the live devs put so many zeroes on the repel number. To be fully honest, the pool idea started as "give people a permanent single-pistol option on all archetypes for RP during gameplay + complete objectives slightly faster + slightly better see-last-mob/glowie" but since the latter two are not standard effects and thus can't be enhanced, I had to add additional effects. That's where the other parts came in - some psi mitigation, a way to encourage mobs to gather (taunt was just how I figured you could encourage the mob AI without using teleport/draw-in), some status protection (as opposed to resistance) to the standard three disablers (hold, sleep, stun), and a self-rez. EDIT: The reason I went with psi defense instead of resist was to purposely block the immediate combo of "I take the psi resist power then slot it with two more psi resist globals so now it's triple-y effective!" and to still leave a psi opening since, without additional defense, there's still a strong chance you get hit and will instead take full damage. It was a cruel choice, to be sure. The consolation is that it would still be useful as a LOTG mule. I'm not good at actual numbers so if the defense by itself would be too polarized or if it's a non-issue to be able to slot Impervium Armor and Aegis' globals into it, totally change it to resistance instead. That's fair. Wait. There's self-rez in the power pools?

That was the idea originally, yeah - that you create the Distraction and it makes an invisible pseudo-pet that generates a very tiny amount of aggro so that enemies are attracted to it instead of the caster but the moment you generate any threat value by being in LOS or attacking the pseudo-pet stops being relevant to them. Probably also should've mentioned I assumed you wouldn't need LOS to place the reticle, since the distraction in-universe could be you throwing your voice or banking an object around a corner so the reticle represents where you intend for it to be seen or heard.

A very good point; I had failed to consider that. My bad! Thanks! I'm not married to specific powers/effects so it's all good. The idea for Distraction was how to get enemies to run over to a location themselves instead of using teleport or draw-in effects - like Metal Gear Solid and other games/movies where the peons will go "WHAT WAS THAT NOISE? [walks over to spot and stands there, staring at something on the floor]" With what Luminara pointed out, going with your -perception would be better. As for Contingency Plan, there were a couple of different ways I thought of going about it - such as an extremely brief but super-high mez resistance on a very long recharge to basically function as an instant break free that only frees you from current mez in that instant that it's activated ("Ha! I was ready for you to trap me!"). That ended up becoming Superior Reasoning as a normal mez protection instead. The reason I went with self-rez was to give people a pool option for self-rez and for the aforementioned "I tricked you" / "I was ready for you to [defeat] me once!" Your alternative effects are good and have unique utility, though untouchable specifically might be redundant with Phase Shift.

tldr version in yellow at the bottom of this post I saw biostem's thread suggesting Pistol Mastery for Scrappers and the responses it got. It seemed pertinent to post about a power pool I had been bouncing around in my head for a couple of weeks now. That being: Sleuthing. (Edit: this isn't throwing any shde at biostem or their idea; it just seemed relevant to post now since they mentioned a pistols options for a melee archetype.) A short preface: I think the existing power pools in the game cover the gamut of generic, not-full-powerset concepts and give good coverage of abilities to double down on strengths or shore up weaknesses very well so it's not lightly I suggest a new pool that would be available to every archetype, both conceptually and mechanically. That being said, let's jump in and I'll explain my reasoning as I go in darker text. Sleuthing You have experience as a detective, journalist, or other investigator that allows you to outsmart your foes and benefit from preparing for missions beforehand. This is a non-travel pool. Out of the gate, this would help cover the detective/journalist concept. I don't believe there's specifically a day job for that yet. Power Level Effect Sidearm 4 (Ranged) Foe Minor Damage (Lethal) Distraction 4 (Location AOE) Foe Taunt, -Range Advanced Investigation 14 [Toggle] Self +Defense (Psionic); [Auto] Self +Special Superior Reasoning 14 [Toggle] Self +Tohit, +Protection (Disorient, Hold, Sleep); [Auto] Self +Special Contingency Plan 14 Self Resurrect, +Protection (XP Debt) I think I got the power levels correct for a power pool? I'm still working off very old knowledge of live where it was 6, 6, 14, 20 but I know they've been lowered since then. If I got the level ranges wrong, please correct me. POWER DETAILS I'm not very good with numbers so I hope the power descriptions and you, the reader's, experience with existing pool powers will suffice to give an idea of how potent the effects should be. Sidearm (Ranged) Foe Minor Damage (Lethal) You carry a trusty sidearm on your person at all times. While just a small-caliber weapon only capable of dealing minor lethal damage to a target, it can come in handy in a pinch or be useful to attack targets out of reach. Damage: Minor Recharge: Fast This would allow people to have a permanent single-pistol power if they are willing to use the power (and pool) pick on it. Hopefully with power customization. The damage is small and could be supplemented with IOs or just serve as a mule. Distraction (Location AOE) Foe Taunt, -Range You create a distraction at a targeted spot, attracting the attention of nearby enemies. Though only momentary, this distraction can be utilized to corral enemies towards a desired spot or to cause them to cluster together. Note that the distraction is only minor, and the presence of you or any allies may supercede it in threat value. Damage: - Recharge: Slow Conceptually, this is the "knock on a wall" or "throw a rock in the distance to attract the faceless minions" trick. Mechanically, it would summon an invisible pseudopet at the location that does very low-magnitude taunt but is otherwise intangible or un-attackable and then disappears after a few seconds, causing enemies to gather around it. This hopefully adds some minor utility that is useful for smaller, lower-level, or inexperienced teams. It's not meant to be doing any favors for end-game TFs/trials that are built to steamroll. Advanced Investigation [Toggle] Self +Defense (Psionic); [Auto] Self +Special By leveraging your field experience, connections to information networks, and some prep time, you can prepare yourself for missions. While this power is active, you have a slight defense bonus against psionics as you are on the lookout for mental attacks as well. You also gain a passive bonus to damage against inanimate, destructable objects in missions and interact with other mission objects 30% faster. Damage: - Recharge: Moderate This would provide an option for psi damage mitigation. I chose defense because: a) without stacking it with other psi defense, it's less useful than resistance, b) being a defense power, it can't slot Impervium Armor or Aegis' psionic resistance enhancements to double its psi mitigation out of the gate. It also grants bonus damage to destructible objectives, which was actually the primary effect I had in mind. I wanted the Sleuthing set to give some sort of boost to mission objectives but definitely did not want any powers to affect rewards (influence, experience, enhancements/salvage/recipe drops). It's also the tier 3 power so that you have to take a prerequisite power pick in the same way as Tough. Superior Reasoning [Toggle] Self +Tohit, +Protection (Disorient, Hold, Sleep); [Auto] Self +Special With your honed observation skills, photographic memory, and some common sense you are able to piece things together with less information and tools than others. While active, this power slightly boosts your tohit chance and grants minor protection from disorient, hold, and sleep effects. You also gain a passive bonus that allows you to see the last groups of enemies and objectives in a mission map earlier than others as well as knowing which enemies hold keys to locked doors. Damage: - Recharge: Moderate This provides some minor mez protection (not resistance) that squishy archetypes could take and is purposely gated behind two prerequisite power picks. As above, I did not want Sleuthing powers to affect rewards or the market but still contribute something unique to missions. While the tech that shows remaining enemies and objectives can be quite jank (as Greycat pointed out in another thread), hopefully this would be workable. I don't know where the line is best - a third remaining? as early as half-way through? - but whatever point makes people feel the power pick adds something. Personally, I don't think seeing objectives or keyholders would break anything. Might just be awkward on story-heavy missions where your character isn't meant to know objectives until specific points in progression. Contingency Plan Self Resurrect, +Protection (XP Debt) You are always prepared for your missions with one or more contingency plans. If you are defeated in battle, you can choose to come back at one-quarter health and endurance as well as being protected from XP debt for a time. Damage: - Recharge: Very Long Mostly also meant for squishies but also potentially for melee archetypes that want a self-rez (eg: Invulnerability). I am aware Return to Battle exists. Very much the "ha, it was all part of my plan so I pretended to be dead / rigged an auto-defib to me beforehand!" Thinking out loud: should the player be able to activate this power early so they can completely avoid debt if they hard-read their impending defeat? tldr I don't suggest a new pool lightly and I hope this covers - a permanent single-pistol power option for all archetypes - the detective skills some comic characters have (conceptually) and powers that slightly boost mission QOL (mechanically) - give options for psi mitigation, mez protection, and a(nother) self-rez, purposely as a pool so it grinds against the Holy Quad Thanks for the read! I'm looking forward to hearing your guys' feedback on the idea.

I believe they're asking for the addition of more ancillary power pools cover a wider range of themes, via pulling from the existing primary/secondary sets. (eg: psychic and sonic on melee, ice on defender and corruptor, earth on blaster and mastermind, etc.) If so, I'm for it.