Latex

Here's my Psi/Kin, the build is very different to yours, maybe you can take something away from it? Focus points of the build; + Perma Haste + Adrenal Boost for thematic + As close to Ranged DEF softcap as possible, almost gets there with Power Boost (44.4%) + Capitalising on Power Boost to bump ToHit to insane levels (63%+ For 60 seconds) + High S/L, S/L seems to be the most common damage that debuffs DEF + Force Feedback in two powers has the potential to hit +Rech cap often + 122.6 Endurance Things the build does bad; - It's not Fire/Kin (I have one already, it's significantly better) - It's Psionic - No ACC in Transfusion, unreliable Healing - Relies heavily on Power Boost for DEF softcap Not sure about and need thoughts!; Psychic Scream (30 Degree AOE -50%(!) Rech) or Psionic Lance (Quickform, Highest Single Target Damage) Build requires some hefty adjustment based on those two powers, currently leaning toward Scream for the debuff and more AOE. Redpulse - Corruptor (Psychic Blast - Kinetics).mbd

Demon-blooded mutant Hero inspired by Magik. Street level no-powers Villainess. Cosmic-Incarnate tier golden-age American Hero. Diamond-skinned psionic mutant inspired by Emma Frost. Sentient clockwork Praetorian concept, but 18+. Spectral-see-through Jello-Ghost. Soviet goth Villainess 'Damn Bitch. You Live Like This?' energy. Bubbly bunny heroine with a dozen sponsorships.

If I could 6 slot LOTG everywhere it's in I would, the 7.5% +Recharge is so good. RES vs Smash/Lethal, amazing, RES vs Psionic/Toxic, amazing (Sad I can't make room for it) What I see people sleeping on is Adrenaline Booster power. When you have a ton of +Rech its so good and gives even more +Recharge, enables perma-haste easier, adds damage, adds a TON of +ToHit too.

Whatever Impervium is, it's not mentioned a single time in the 2004 lore bible, so it must of been added later, which is odd because that means it has zero foreshadowing and is likely just 'salvage description fluff' or maybe part of Praetorian lore.

I believe the Porcelain masks contain fragments of Giovanna Scaldi's soul, she willingly undertook this ritual and died during it in attempt to counter the Church and a Bishop called Abelard. She was an extremely powerful mutant psychic in 17th century Venice that turned an entire town of elites into her puppets. Description of the masks is like an 'Eyes Wide Shut' masquerade vibe, full-face, porcelain & enamel, containing a fragment of Scaldi's soul that basically overtakes you(?). But the masks all look similar to Giovanna Scaldi whom was a courtesan serving the elites of Venice in the 1700's. Here are some direct quotes written by Sean Fish (Manticore). There is much more lore on the Carnival of Shadows, I get the feeling the OG Developers had a soft-spot for them, there's a ton more reading from Page 120 onward of the 'COH Bible'. CoHBible-1.pdf

Well balance in CoH revolves around debuffs, I'd say -RES is the most powerful debuff (maybe -Regen, idk), when I see my Battle Axe critting for 2400 on a debuffed target that defines my fun, it's fun to just smack stuff as hard as possible, bigger number better, this is an RPG and all RPG's since the dawn of time rely on bigger number better it is the entire progression system of every RPG ever. There are outliers that are flat out terrible in terms of... everything, no matter how you IO build them, they'll always be terrible. Psi Melee, Regen, to name a couple off the top of my head. I'd love to use Psi, it has some cool unique animations but it's so utterly unfun for someone who likes the RPG staple of 'bigger number better'. I'm all for total revamps of drastically bad outliers like Psi and Regen. Some powersets need a rethink from the ground up to be competitive and thus fun for many. You will be hard pressed to find someone who finds the weakest powersets fun in any other RPG, DnD session or anything 'I like this, but I wish it was a bit better.'

A lot of examples here are PVE games, Helldivers 2 is PVE, MH:W is PVE, I don't think balance is as important in some PVE games. - Helldivers Dev is off the mark though, the lack of balance hit that game hard and they lost a lot of players because of the way they balanced. - In a game like Marvel Rivals the game will live or die (exactly like Overwatch did) off balance, if your favourite Hero is statistically garbage you are going to lose more games than you win, this means annoying/letting down your 5 teammates, whether they're friends or randos. - Same for a game like Path of Exile 1 and 2 where meta's form and the game turns stagnant because it's utterly figured out. It's impossible to balance some things. But if you have a meta form and allow it to dominate the game then your game has an issue that will eat away at it's gameplay. City of Heroes is no different, thing is in this game it's hard to gauge what is truly by the numbers mathematically meta because it has as many variations in builds as Path of Exile, there is without a doubt some meta picks in COH; Kinetics, Ice Debuffing, Sonic -RES, Fire Brute Farming. It also doesn't have the tools like other games do; World of Warcraft's combat log tech/parse calculators are able to define the best played and most minmaxed characters and groups in the world, this is a metric that might get you recruited into an esports team or earn you fame in 'World First' races. Should meta builds be nerfed? Some argue buffing everything else makes more sense but then you end up in a situation like Diablo 3 ended up in where Blizzards ethos was the only ever buff which lead to making the game a total circus. I think it's better to spread out the access to the defining characteristics of a meta powersets so there are other picks equally as good or better in situations the other isn't. e.g. give a couple other powersets it's own riff on Fulcrum Shift for examples sake- not a copy/paste, more something that mathematically ends up just as powerful, being able to reliably hit damage cap from a single powerset is kind of absurd, more powersets should be able to compete with that. I think good example is what they did with Fire Armor on Homecoming they nerfed it in farming but improved how it feels and leant in on what makes Fire Armor a pick for those that want it, not sure on the broader community consensus on the Fire Armor nerf, but I'm loving my character with the fire changes, I don't bother with farming though but it is still the best 'all out offense' powerset. - Try as hard as they might, they'll always be a meta in every single game, it is impossible to balance. - Ignoring the meta will turn the game stagnant with very little flexibility for optimal builds. - The perfectly balanced game is one where the meta is hard to make out because powers/skills/weapons/whatever are more focused on user skill and when it is inevitably figured out the margin between S+ tier and D tier is 5% difference to the point user skill can actually make a D tier power/skill/weapon/character S+ tier with good game knowledge. This enables two playstyles, the real meta player who puts in the extra mile to be 5% better than everyone else not playing that powers/skills/weapons/whatever and the D tier which is only 5-10% behind but doesn't have to put in anywhere near the effort to be 'almost as good'.

There is a single mention of Atlantis in the City of Heroes Bible a.k.a the document actually used in development of the original game, this is as canon as canon gets. If you want to read the 500+ page Bible yourself, here it is; CoHBible-1.pdf

Dark Blast/Martial Arts Blaster Comes with a combat Teleport (frees up a power pool choice) that you could use Rikti portals effect with a purple-blueish hue (or even the smoke effect, can't remember if you can tint the smoke). Play it focused on melee - I do on my Sonic/MA Blaster and it's by leagues my favourite character, I play like a Scrapper and do absolutely fine, with Dark Blasts -ToHit you'd do even better.

I went with Gladiator -RES in mine, purely because I have nowhere else to slot it in my build, ideally I don't think you want procs in a toggle though. Got 2x Overwhelming Force elsewhere in attacks, but it's very very strong too.

The article is spot on and it's the exact same for the majority of large private servers. Homecoming is immune from criticism. When it comes to the people very loyal to it people forget it's... history... rather quickly and conveniently which anyone remotely invested in this community knows about already. Alas, it's the same for all Private servers and isn't limited to City of Heroes. TurtleWoW also a massive project and I believe is larger than HC has the same issues, even has a cash shop - they rely on this oppose to donations to keep the servers ticking, but are also for-profit. btw that's a cash shop I've seen people defend in public channels, if a server is private or an emulation not ran by big bad Blizzard it's fine to pay for convenience and cosmetics (bag slots, mobile bank, mobile auction house, etc). But the moment it has a corporation behind it using the same methods to make profit, it's bad. Now, after the NCSoft deal it kind of officialises things I'd think NCSoft have stamped their logo on this project and they won't want to be taken for a ride or have their image smeared by any rogue actions by HC's owners or affiliates, so like any company, they are and should be criticised else things turn into an echo chamber of yes-men which is how things can quickly die by meeting no resistance to any choice made, that's what toxic positivity is. Edit; Also think the writers of the article say it's becoming more common because population counts dwindle and it's the more hardcore players who stay behind. I know friends in-game where this is the only game they'll play (which is wild to me, but each their own!) so seeing people who actually enjoy what's going on stay be toxically positive is a given, it's just how things go in any hobby, anywhere.

It's an ego thing for sure. When you really crunch the game down to it's core it's a Diablo-esque game and one of the best 'screen wipe' abilities in COH is Fold Space, telling people to not use it is absolutely an ego thing of "I'm the tank and you're not letting ME live that fantasy, stop it!" even if the mobs don't even need tanking at all and the group kills the mobs significantly faster when they're balled up.

The 'no MM's' thing is utterly bizarre to me. I Roleplay and a minmax within constraints I set myself, and every Pylon spreadsheet I've seen puts MM's often at TWICE the dps than every other AT except Crabs (Yes, even demolishing Stalker Energy Melee on ST). What people often forget about Pylon DPS is that it's also a survivability check, e.g. you're taking hits off it too. Seems like a skill issue on the team lead side, minmaxing this game at anything less than 4-star is negligible.

Thanks for the advice here, I think I've got a better build because of it! Not played it yet, I really enjoy having a build before diving in. A few things; Mainly Scrapper for the big Crits on Battle Axe, my main character is a Sonic/MA Blaster that's 100% Melee, I figure if I survive without issue on her I could on this! I am a little worried about this mobs running away thing, I think in this build most standard mobs will be dead before I even put down Burn. I didn't put Crit Strikes in Cleave, I think primary AOE attack will be; Axe Cyclone (acts like a reverse repel to pull-in enemies) this will activate crit strikes > Pendulum this should trigger 100% FF recharge > Cleave for big damage to also capitalise on crit strikes I built around Shadow Meld this time, aiming for 45% all DEF while it's active, then focused on Recharge much more to bring the cooldown of that down. Basically I should be able to shrug off 'alpha strikes' if Shadow Meld is active. Focused much more on Heal, 6 slotted with Preventative Medicine Also focused more on Consume too, 6 slotted with Synapse's Shock 2 slotted most key recharge powers, like Hasten, Fiery Embrace, and Fold Space Swapped Combat Jumping for Manoeuvres Added knockback protection to Combat Teleport (I can't figure out how to 50+5 Regular IO's but I think Hasten would be Perma in this build.) I'd really like to fit in Phoenix Rising, it sounds like a very good nuke and a stun? But I really don't think I can give up a single power. Take a look if you want, maybe there's a bit more polish to add or something vital I've missed, thanks again for your advice! I really like what the Devs have done with Fire, on paper it looks great and all out on the offense which I really love! Totally not Magik II - Scrapper (Battle Axe - Fiery Aura).mbd

I'm hoping to make a homage to Magik one of my favourite X-men with a build that's using Fire Armor. Whilst this is a Tanker forum I think Sovera might be the person to ask about Fire Armor, I figure I might get more damage (and less survivability) as a Scrapper pairing Battle Axe with Fire Armor? Maybe I'm underestimating Tank damage? (I went off Ston's tierlist just to try and gauge it.) The idea is to pull them in with Axe Cyclone into a Burn Patch and watch them melt, then Combat Teleport to the next battle, just like Magik would with her stepping discs. Trying to make my own build, are there pitfalls to look out for? Skippable powers? Do I need Knockback Protection? Ideally I'd like to hit 45% DEF but lean harder on damage than anything else - I never play solo, the chaos of big teams is something I find more fun. Totally not Magik - Scrapper (Battle Axe - Fiery Aura).mbd