Crysis

Nothing to add to what Mek already wrote here, and my experience has been very similar. The only thing I’ve found is that I’d put Ninja slightly ahead of Demons in normal PvE and with heavy use of smokeflash for the extra “go crit crazy” DPS. Thugs was dead last for me, but still very good, even outshining my beloved Thugs/Storm w/Burnout build. /Time is the only MM secondary that I’ve found that comes close to /Marine Affinity for MM’s, although /Cold helps them a bunch for adding defense. My one and only complaint about /Marine, and you’ll notice it far more with Mercs/Marine than other sets, is the raw summon and prep time. Exemp down and need to resummon? 40-50 seconds required to resummon, wait for Commando to finally parachute in (summon him first), equip with both upgrades, summon Barrier Reef, apply Shifting Tides to Commando, drop Tord/Abyss and THEN you are ready. During Tinpex right before you do the final Neuron/Bobcat mission, dismiss everything to avoid the stupid henchman TP bug. Then you are dead last to the fight while you do all the above and still summon Lores. It’s a crazy long sequence. Fortunately, you don’t have to resummon them as often outside of incarnate speed runs so that’s a plus.

I’m rather pleasantly surprised when I meet someone in-game who either a) never played it back on Live or b) did play it on Live but recently ‘rediscovered’ it. Yesterday I did an ITF with someone who had never done an ITF before and had no idea how IO set bonuses worked. They were on a Tank which, thankfully, can handle a lot of damage even poorly slotted but it was obvious as a Tanker they’d never dealt with more than one spawn at a time. By the second mission, they were repeatedly face-planting due to ambushes. So we started chatting during rest of missions (I was on a MM) and I just told him to put himself on follow on my Commando and attack stuff near it and I’d keep him upright for remainder of TF. Hey, I love new players….free bonus pets! Too bad I have to use chat to command them though. This game ain’t toxic. Just players who are uninformed and used to playing solo make it that way.

Generally, yes. If we have a straggler I offer to TP them. If someone is always getting low on health, and I have a heal, I use it on them. If I notice they are grabbing aggro, I cozy up to them, drop a patch and Fold Space on the aggro-er. If they aren't doing much of anything, I'll call them out. Or kick them if they just stand there doing nothing. Yes I monitor the team and their actions. Otherwise, why not just solo?

Sounds a LOT like the old “invisible Katana” bug that persisted for a long, long time. Out of curiosity, is it invisible to everyone on your team as well? Or just to the user?

I often use ChatGPT for inspiration for bio’s and such. This is kind of a neat little prompt generator for getting ideas for new alts.

Someone wrote a ChatGPT character creator. Name, powers, Bio and character image all in one. Check it out! https://www.reddit.com/r/Cityofheroes/s/PkZ33BETsf

So I just checked in-game, I did make some changes from the build I posted. -Soothing has 2 slots, 53 Golgi's in each one -Took out both %Damage procs from Shoal Rush. They don't do much. Left the Achilles in there. -Pulled one slot from Barrier Reef. It now has 3 Reactives (Res, Res/End and Proc) and 2 53 Golgi's. Absorb is worth more than Defense. -Put two of those free slots into Shifting Tides. 5 slotted Ragnarok (no Knockdown Proc) and for sixth slot put in the Gaussian Proc. It goes off quite a bit. -Put the last free slot into M30 Nade and made that an Overwhelming Force Acc/Dam.....mainly for the additional Regen bonus. This set seems to thrive on all the +Health/+Regen you can throw at it. Hope this helps!

Just do remember that almost all the old guides regarding Mercs are totally outdated. The major MM overhaul that impacted Mercs took them from middle tier to amazeballs. And with the new “hard mode” TF settings ranged henchmen have a decisive edge, even with one or more Destiny>Barriers running. I have a Ninjas/Marine MM as well and while they are quite sturdy now, I still have to resummon them far more on hard mode trials than I ever have to do my Mercs or Bots. Big difference in quality of play for the MM.

Changed very little from what @Meknomancer posted originally, although I insist on Fold Space on my Marine Affinity toons....although YMMV. This is what I ended up with, although I think I managed to drop an extra slot into Shifting Tides and put a purple set in there....will have to go in game and double check. Sirens_SEALs_MercMarine.mbd

I tend to not be a wasteful person in life, and this trait follows me into gaming. I have so many fully T4’d out 50’s, many sporting 4-5 Purple sets and tons of Hami-O’s, that I feel wasteful letting them sit there, unused, while I go off and buy more for a new project. That said, sometimes I’ll “melt down” an old alt that I no longer play via a respec so I can grab all their enhancements into the trays and then just delete them entirely. Other times, if I think the toon -may- someday be better after some Dev love (looking at you Storm Blast alts), I’ll use enhancement unslotters to grab their ATO’s, Purples, Winter Event enh and their HamiO’s via Unslotters and pass them off to another toon. It’s easy enough to reslot them should they ever be more than lackluster appeal again after a dev update, but since I’m not playing them, no sense leaving “gold rims on the car up on jacks in the garage” as they say.

I mean technically don’t all the badges collected from the hero/villain bank/mayhem missions add up to Task Force Commander/Invader Accolade?

This is the definitive method for using FS when you -have- a tank. I play a great many PUG’s where we have no tank and the ground patches that the players drop (notably of the knockdown variety) -ARE- the “tank” or at least the target for Fold Space. What gets me with the power is the haphazard nature of sometimes dropping the targets BEHIND my summoner and then sometimes dropping it in FRONT of me. So regardless, I’m generally trying to stand in the middle of the patch of (/insertpowernamehere) so as to try and get as many inside of its AoE as possible.

Morality dictates that you be as conscientious of others limited play time as you expect them to be of yours, independent of knowledge of game mechanics. Players shouldn’t volunteer to join a team in Cim for example when a) they don’t know how to get there, b) they have to obtain the ability to get there and c) they make everyone else wait 15 minutes so that they can actually get there. They are imposing their lack of knowledge and infringing on my limited playtime. It’s not much different than using Group Fly and ‘forcing’ it on everyone else for the next 30mins to 1.5 hours of a TF because once you start using it, if they then choose to turn it off, it’s too late short of forcing everyone to wait outside a mission while they run off to go to Null the Gull to make the necessary changes. Oh and that’s not even possible if running a TF….they are locked in with you using your “crutch” until the end. Look, I play Bots MM’s too, and I have Group Fly on many of them. But I always ask if anyone has an issue with me using it before using it exactly for this reason. I’ve gotten kicked off of teams/TF’s before for using it and some of the players being unable to activate their own powers. If I’m being totally honest, I’m with @Bionic_Flea’s assessment. It’s a great power with poor implementation. Should have never been coded to affect anyone outside of the player themselves without an in-game prompt asking if you’d like to allow PlayerX to affect you with their Group Fly. Because the “morality” of any power that can adversely impact another’s ability to play the game using the full range of their powers is “bad” outside of PvP. By way of challenge, I do want you to rethink Group Fly as a “crutch.” If you know how to properly stance and control your pets, outside of maybe Shadow Shard/dimension missions, I can’t think of a single tactical reason why I need to use Group Fly. Absolute worst case for me is to dismiss and resummon, which I have on macro’s for all MM alts. Group Fly is less to do with utility and more about the vanity of the rocket boots on bots.

Couple of builds posted here…

I have both Bots/ and Demon/EA’s, and now both Bots/ and Demon/Marine. They are both great secondaries for harmonizing with MM’s pets. I will say that although it’s a bit FOTM, I find /Marine to be especially tuned towards benefitting MM’s. At first, I felt it favored melee-centric MM’s more than ranged pets, but since building and leveling Bots/ Mercs/ Demon/ and Ninja/ (still have a Thugs/Marine out there I’m not sure I’ll finish) I find it plays exceedingly well with both types of pets, you just have slightly different playstyles. Not sure it fits your Brainiac theme though…..but then again, Aquaman had telepathic comms with undersea life, so hey…maybe? Also a big shout out to /Time. My first MM was a Bots/Time back on Live, and I remade her on Homecoming as well. Bio was that she was a help desk engineer, and she’d use time travel as a means of moving forward in the timestream to figure out how to solve problems, then travel back to fix them in the present. But a glitch happened and she and her repair bots were now trapped in our timeline. So with a little imagination, you can make pretty much any powerset fit your theme. Here’s a 1023-character approved bio for a Bots/Time mastermind: ”Dr. Victor Hart was a brilliant scientist whose quest for ultimate knowledge led him to create the NeuroSync System, a groundbreaking cybernetic link that connected him with six advanced robots. Each robot, uniquely designed, amplified his cognitive abilities, allowing him to control complex systems and manipulate technology with ease. Victor’s experiments with temporal physics granted him the power to control time, enabling him to foresee crimes, reverse disastrous events, and outmaneuver any adversary. Now, as the enigmatic hero ChronoMind, he uses his combined mental prowess and time-bending abilities to protect humanity from threats, unraveling the darkest of crimes with precision and intellect.” ChatGPT can be super fun for trying to create themed backstories.

She hit 50 and is working incarnates now. Thus far I'd place her kill speeds just about on Par with Ninjas and a little faster than Necro. Mercs, as noted elsewhere, seem to have the fastest kill rates.

I routinely powerfarm an alt up to level 35 or so, generic name/costume, based on a fun thematic powered that i read about here on forums or just had as an inspiration at some point, often after watching someone else use one or both powersets in game. They sit there at 35, unleveled, until I have a bio, name, costume and build ready for them. Then I pull them out, clothe and level and slot them up, and solo Black Scorps arc to get a feel for the build and unlock the Patron Pools. Then as long as it plays well I'll dedicate all my playtime on that one character until I unlock T3 for Alpha, Destiny and Lore. If the character feels "powerful" to me I'll take them to T4 all incarnates, achieve several accolades and then park them in the Hive (for Hami raids) or other zones where I think they may still be fun to play. Otherwise at T3 or T4 status achieved....they are stripped of all slotted IOs and deleted. As a result, I've no "main" but rather several old alts I'm fond of playing now and then and a constant stream of noobs.

I have Combat TP on this and my Mercs/Marine so lining up the cone isnt so much an issue, but I hear your point on the puny heal Soothing provides. I spam it frequently for the debuff, but still lose a guy now and then. Do you dedicate many slots to Maintenance drone? I’ve seen builds with just a 50+5 Heal IO in there and then others with 5-6 slotted Preventative or Panacea slotting. I already have Depths slotted with one of those two full sets. And your comment about dropping Brine is interesting. I have a Priority Target macro I use to apply Brine and focus all fire on same after Ive applied Brine. I sort of hoped the -Regen from the MM personal attacks would complement the -MaxHP debuff of Brine. I already see up to Lieuts one shotted after Brine, and Boss/EB/AV it clearly makes a difference. Its not the same as Benumb from /Cold but its effective. No synergy between those two stacked on same target?

Since the updates to MM’s slotting the bots themselves is pretty straightforward. But with Marine I have a decent heal with Soothing Wave, and thus maintenance drone seems rather superfluous. And since they’ve moved the -regen to MM’s attacks I’d like to fit in at least two, understanding of course that they are end hogs and do almost dismissive damage unless procc’d out (which they won’t be as I’ll be using them mainly for set mules and for the -regen). Otherwise I’m slotting /Marine pretty much the same as I did for my Mercs/Marine and playing it mostly the same way. Eg; Whitecap in, drop Tide Pool on spawn, leap back out (or Combat TP out if I’m in a Tar Patch), drop Brine on the Boss, toss out Shoal here and there, buff/heal henchmen as needed. Am I missing anything by skipping maintenance drone?

Sorry, one more question. Does the Double XP apply to Incarnate XP towards earning the slots or not? Was all this covered somewhere in release notes because I can't seem to locate those if so.

If I am multitasking, which I often am, playing the game solo on indoor missions while sitting in a boring conference call, I almost always turn off my chat box. Entirely. If I think about it, I sometimes even use the ghide function to just isolate myself fully from invites, chats, general chat, whatever. And increasingly, I'm playing on a handheld PC. Chatting is awkward and takes some effort on those devices. It's hard enough to play this game via keyboard+mouse on a smaller device (I bought a folding keyboard and small mouse for travel) but that screen size is so small I really need the screen real estate back that the chat box takes up otherwise. And lets be honest, many of us who play regularly are here from the Live days, and that was 20+ years ago. My eyes aren't what they were 20 years ago, and the chat box needs a higher font size for me to use effectively, and that just takes up even more real estate. I will open up the Team chat box if I'm teaming, but habits being what they are, I sometimes am guilty of not reading it regularly as I should. I'm sure my SG mates think I'm being a snob or rude, but I don't mean to be. I'm just more focused on gaming than I am on chatting. I'd also say some of the BEST times I've had playing COH or any other multiplayer game is via voice chat, not typed chat. But there's precious few people who want to play that way, either due to shyness, language barriers, 'immersion' concerns or even technical limitations of their hardware. I just type all of this first to address your concerns that individual preferences and playstyle may just make the chat box less than useful to some players. PS-I have more than 30 people in my global ignore, but none of them for failure to respond to me. All because they were, IMHO, jerks and people I don't wish to ever play with again, let alone talk to in game. PPS-To the idea of allowing a team leader to override my screen with their forced comments dialog or whatever.....that is going to open up an outrageous form of in-game chat spamming. I already have people who ask me to read their blog or website or whatever showing up in broadcast. Imagine if I could simply interrupt your play session at will? As with all things, you do you, let others do likewise.

Amplifiers are really good if you exemp down and aren’t sporting an optimized leveling build (many of mine are end game builds). They effectively equate to an “exemp level shift” or two at lower levels. Critters at lower levels have a hard time punching through the buffs they offer. Heck, just the mez protection from the amplifiers is worth it. Also always take the temp attacks, at least the freebies. Sometimes you need a ranged weapon like the Blackwand to do a pull. Or just because it looks cool just equipping it for magic themed characters. And I rarely take full travel powers these days as between Athletic/Ninja/beast run and sprint plus a flight pack you’ve got that covered. Between those and built in health/stamina these days those really free up some other useful power picks.

So its both double XP -and- influence rewards vs using a double xp booster where you get no rewards. Then yes def the new way to PL.

2.5 years away? A lot? A whole lot. I suggest you go spend some time in the Patch notes and perhaps read through them. Too many changes to even begin to outline them all here. But do know these three things..... 1) Sentinels got some love and are actually half decent now. 2) Several MM primary sets were reworked and turned from meh to OMGWTFBBQ (Ninjas, Necro and Mercs in particular), and one of the newest sets (Marine Affinity) appear to be almost tailor made to benefit MM's. 3) There's little reason to roll a Brute these days vs a Tank....although I put this last one on the list purely to pick fights. Seriously, go read the patch notes since you've been gone! Patch Notes - Homecoming (homecomingservers.com)

Yeah good callout. Although does that work in AE also?