Chronicler J

Hold on, let me get my crutches out of the closet. Might break a hip fighting Council without them.

Maybe we finally need better tiering on mobs at 35-50? The old tiering is archaic. Minions and Lieutenants are pathetic.

It's a horrible power, and the pass it got was feeble. Felt more like changes meant for a Sentinel.

With how pathetic most of the enemy types in this game are, I wouldn't be surprised it's easy mode.

Kinetics is (still) the most overrated set of all time.

It has Beanbag.

Oh! Oh! I wanna be king of the city daycare!

So with the revamp of Assault Rifle on the horizon and the permanent low-tier status of the set, I feel we need a successor to AR. Enter: Advanced Rifle It will have both Aim and Beanbag, completely outclassing its ancient predecessor. As a new set, it will also be free from the problematic nature of improving an old set. M30 Grenade and Flamethrower will be combined into a superior TAoE, Buckshot will become a serviceable cone, Full Auto will be usable, and Ignite will have actual DPA without fear.

I love the cover photo. I feel so powerful when I mash minions.

One is good at killing minions, the other has actual utility.

Empathy. Never looked back, never will. Detractors won't understand.

Play Thermal.

With randoms, probably.

City of Hero The meme never dies.

Kinetics is the most overrated set of all time.

Agreed, although Romulus' bonus mechanics in phase 2 were somewhat underwhelming. We adapted to Lores and Barrier the first time we ever encountered them. It was a pleasure to have to coordinate around something the boss was doing. Vanguard Bonus Boss was a little bit too much like an Architect encounter, but Romulus actually had surprises as the fight progressed. I think my biggest issue with the fight was how Phase 2 felt easier than Phase 1. I know the Void bombs were meant to present a unique opportunity to encourage awareness and movement, but I think the scenario needed to evolve as the fight progressed. Barrier was interesting, but felt one dimensional until he dropped Lores. This is promising, though; perhaps in the future we'll get a boss fight with sub-objectives similar to the first phase. It was a huge improvement over the Midas fight. Midas, by contrast, presents no direct threat to the team. Romulus is far more threatening even without his tricks. I think Midas definitely needs to be re-visited in the future since it feels heavily unfinished. I'd like to see Romulus get another wave of Lore drops in that last section. If it was manageable as 4 people, that's nowhere near enough for 8. Plus I think you shouldn't be able to leave the boss room once you enter. We completely cheesed the Talon ambush because of this.

It was necessary for coordination; first phase was an absolute pain. We're pretty in-tune with each other when we play outside of preferences, so sometimes communication isn't even a forethought.

Just a little bit of aggro control, please.

Despite my blast set being nerfed into the ground, still managed to make an impact. #NoWakes

The crux of the issue. The most important tool the game has, and yet those who wish to utilize it for the right reasons must suffer. There are better ways to do this than shutting off XP at 50. They require effort, however.

Spent years doing this on my Empathy/Sonic. Now that this set is being nerfed for Support-focused roles, I have unlimited amounts of regret that I didn't pick Dark Blast to build a legacy instead. Those of you that do much easier content (anything sub-Relentless ASF and Hardcore AE) will never notice the difference. But I don't want to change what I play just to suit somebody's fancies per these changes; I refuse. The devs may believe the game is "telling" us to play a certain way, yet for the last 3 years my group and I have challenged the notion of what is or is not possible in this game. Those experiences taught me an incredible amount about Empathy and Sonic Attack. Once I understood how my blast set could be utilized, I never dreamed of being anything other than Sonic Attack, and I finally put to rest my fears of never having chosen Dark Blast... Until now. The set is being reduced to garbage in the hands of a hard support character, completely knocking it out of the same tiering as Dark Blast, Radiation Blast, Ice Blast and Electrical Blast. Any one of those is a much better pick to build with if you want to focus on making a Support Defender. But I don't want to play those sets; I don't want to start over just because someone wanted to make Sonic Control and homogenize everything Sonic in the same breath. I don't care what anyone--even a dev--says about what a Blast set is meant to do. I know what this set was capable of, because I've been to the peaks this game has to offer. If this is all I can look forward to with these changes, then I'd like to get a refund on the set, because I know per the Tanker changes that fighting this is like screaming into the wind.

It'd be nice if people could play damage. Doesn't take long with 3 people that know how to deal high damage properly.

ASF? Nah. +4 Prog, baby.

That's why we, as a minority, have to rise up and speak out--to each other.

LFG for Prog? Yikes. I usually stick to voice for it, yeah. Easy-Mode content like ITF, STF, LRSF and Training-Wheels-Difficulty ASF belong in LFG. When I want to feel actual accomplishment in this game, I break down the door to Discord and strap in. That +4 Prog is comin'.