brass_eagle

First off -- bug with the power recharge icon display: Temporal Bomb's icon (at one point not sure when) -- locked into it's smallest size while recharging. The power had 3 Melee AoE procs, 2 damage IOs, and KB --> KD Sudden Accel proc. No recharge. To fix it I tried a few things: Logging out and back in did not work Changing to a character that also had Temporal Bomb and had the same issue. Restarting the CoH client did not work. Not sure if it is just on my end or if anyone else has experienced this. ----------------------------------------- Anyways... tl;dr at bottom After using this power on 2 different characters, I'm nonplussed toward Temporal Bomb. It just doesn't impress me, especially for a capstone power. Better than Time Bomb I suppose, but that shouldn't be the metric. Pros: Source of recharge (traps LIVES off recharge though only 37.5%) Wide radius of buff / debuff temporal bubble (55 ft) The temporal bubble is mostly see through and not intrusive for its large size (wink wink* give Dampening field that fx option!) Movement speed is small enough to not annoy teammates, but nice enough to aid in navigating the battlefield. Decent duration for a hallway fight (lasts ~45 seconds), not so much for tougher targets. Cons: The explosion is very bright and intrusive - personally I hate being in melee range with it. I would consider skipping it for this alone. The ground explosion effect is cool though. No customizable cosmetic options. The buff / debuff effects are not enhanceable (slow / end mod / movement). The damage is token at best. It's just there to keep the concept of 'bomb'. Enhanced, it takes a little more than a fourth of an even con minion's health. Due to the nature of the power, it will proc only when the moon turns blue. Long cast time. Requires melee range (have to dismiss or grant invisibility FF gen if you want to "surprise" the enemy. Cannot use the burnout trick to get 2 fields at the same time. Another long recharge power needing lots of set bonuses to have your buff / debuff effects anywhere near constant. Costs ~28 endurance from what I can see. KB tax, not great with the FF proc (but there really isn't anything else to slot). I have to disagree with you on the cast time, Cap. In a vacuum, you are correct IMO. But for the sets mainstay powers... Poison trap 2.77, Acid Mortar 2.77, Triage Beacon 2.77, Seeker drones 2.03. There is a pattern that makes another 2.77 cast time cumbersome for traps (we'll just ignore the old 5 second interruptible version of trip mine here). But if nothing can be done about it, thems the ropes. In gameplay, I found myself always having something else better to use for the situation or next power. It's both a power that almost requires prior set up, but also keeps you in the same place for it's effect. You'll have to dismiss your FF gen / make it invisible if you want to do the "surprise bomb". The endurance mod increase (37.5%) is only just enough to recover the cost of the bomb if you stay inside for the full 45 seconds. I hate to be so critical. A lot of hard work as probably gone into this and it is a cool concept. But this power has so many requirements to be used in normal play. The power works as an opener, not one to use near the end of a fight. It might work a little better if you could use it on teammates, strapping it on before they run in (who said your teammates can't be traps!)... Yes, I'm aware of the "healing arrow" arguements, but just say the were in a different "time" or whatever. Maybe I'm looking at it the wrong way or undervaluing it, but I'd only use it if I had nothing else to use. Someone convince me! The power won't make me want to use traps any more or less. Feels bad for a capstone. tl;dr One-slot not-so-wonder. It's better than the unusable Time Bomb but inherits the same problems along with new ones. Meh.

Not looking forward to fighting them if they have a self rez akin to Super Stunners. The pack I was fighting didn't seem to self rez on me. Hopefully they are rare. A lot of the time the team waits around for the Super Stunner to finish his animation... just to be the only target of the team. Slows it down in an annoying way. I could see self rezzing minions with a toned down version. But the bosses are usually the last to go soo.. the team waits. Maybe just have it as a death nuke-ish power. Rather than have them rez on top of that. Like the Ghouls.

So I'm still working through the arcs. Always awesome to have new content. But can I ask-- Do we have to stick with contacts that have a 5-level range? Trying to run zone arcs without outleveling is a personal gripe of mine. I don't like it in Faultline, and I don't like it in Croatoa. Can't the contacts just span the level range of the zone: 20-29? I like to team and progress. Feels bad having to turn off xp to "plan" to take the arcs (even if you aren't using double xp).

Can smoke canister get something in the description / detailed info window about aggro type for the power? I know it says "cannot see past melee range" - but it wasn't obvious to me that "enemies will not notice this attack". ---editing to add (small enough for one post) Clocking device combat text might be using the blaster version: It doesn't affect health / end that I can see from descriptions.

Huh, that metal bell ring is sure to give me a headache if I listen to it too long. The siren is fine I suppose. If it's not a bug, I'll just have to always make sure I don't go in with sound on. Carry on.

I'm only seeing 37.5% recharge bonus on Defender. Is it intended to be the same? It's not listed in the patch notes.

I think Possess if fine, and could be fun. But I'm a person who takes and uses the new Dimension Shift sometimes. And I still don't like Black Hole. Anyway, I'll end that rant there--not to derail further.

It's almost as if that's what black holes are famous for! Seconded. Oh and do the other versions too. On a more feedback note... I saw black hole in the power selection reading the notes and was baffled by its presence. There are much better survivability tools by level 40ish that don't annoy your teammates and disrupt gameplay flow. The power has been on the wrong end of jokes and criticism for ages, possibly back to the launch of the game. I recall being told not to use Dimension Shift (at that time a Black Hole clone) when I was new to the game around Issue 2ish. There are some niche arguments for its existence, mostly solo, but they are incredibly reaching to justify its use on a regular basis. Even as an Oh S**t power, it doesn't rise to the occasion or it confuses your teammates why their powers were wasted on it before realizing. I've only ever taken it once as a novelty. In my experience with powers like these (including detention field style), they don't affect the targets you may really want them to--like those harpies in Summer Block Buster. Find another power or something. I'm just left confused by this choice--not Possess style.

I almost always play without sound, so I may just be noticing it now. But every police station I have gone into (Talos, Founders Falls, Kings Row) has an alarm going off with a constant, earsplitting old-fashioned bell ring. Doesn't seem right, especially when the NPCs are just standing around.

I'll admit, I did burst into a hearty chuckle when I saw it. The effect is easily mitigated by switching targets for Levitate. Or don't use Levitate. Problem solved and it keeps a fun novelty.

The patch notes do not list the doubling of recharge time from 60 seconds to 120 seconds. In the two missions I have run thus far (solo) it feels too long. It already has a hefty endurance penalty. I can imagine that this won't be ready for the next mob on a team. Not to mention, recharge does not start until you detoggle. Seems unfair. On another note, I had a weird experiences with the power when I was mezzed--some enemies weren't aggro. Trying to see if I can replicate.

Sooo I was testing out the new Telekinesis. And also experienced the whole group going up in the air with Levitate. While this feature is funny, I'm not sure it would be fun in normal play perse (Maybe add KU resistance to the main target?):

***Later I realized you can't even slot Overwhelming Force in wormhole. Doh! However, I think you are describing intended behavior of the power. Wormhole does not inherently cause aggro, not even on teleported, knockdown/back, and stunned targets. You can test this by Wormhole-ing any level appropriate group to a location out of aggro range. Any aggro would likely be from pets, proc enhancements, your own powers, or your proximity. As was pointed out, Wormhole's teleport is too low of a magnitude to have any effect on +3 bosses. This is true for +4 lieutenants as well. Are you seeing anything other than the scenarios below (not taking into account special resistances)?: HIT! (+4 minion, +3 LT, +2 Boss) --Visual fx -- Teleported, knocked, & stun magnitude applied HIT! (+4 LT, +3 Boss) --Visual fx -- Knocked & stun magnitude applied MISS! (any target) --No effects applied. If so, then it might be a bug (provided I have all the scenarios correct).

Another thought--what enhancement do you have slotted to convert to knockdown? If it's the Overwhelming Force proc for KB to KD with a chance for KD, that might cause aggro.

Cloudburst is 10 ticks of damage. What you are showing is damage ticks 1, 2 & 3 with scourge on ticks 1, 2 & 3. It only checks on the cast (for normal attacks). If scourge procs, all ten ticks will scourge. You can see 10 ticks of damage and 10 procs of scourge from one cast below:

Half of Dark Watcher's Despair enhancement set attuned enhancements can be equipped at level 7 and the other half require level 17. Confirmed the lower level attuned can be slotted and it isn't just a typo. Examples are from my level 10 Trick Arrow who I encountered this on (couldn't slot half the set without realizing before buying):

Discovered this weird effect while playing on my Dark/Ninja blaster. I'm not sure if this is intended or not, but it doesn't work like this in other confuse powers in my experience. Slotting the Coercive Persuasion: Contagious Confusion proc has a high chance to suppress a stealth enhancement's effect while slotted in Blinding Powder from Ninja Training. This is despite the "will not alert enemies" flag for the proc and power. Stealth from Shinobi or Super Speed did not suppress when testing. The suppression only seems to occur when either the confusion is not applied or is too low mag to confuse AND the Contagious proc hits. The AoE effect of the proc does not seem to matter. On a non-boss single target, you have a 50% chance of the stealth being suppressed. For groups, it's almost a guarantee. With the short range of the cone, mobs will see through Shinobi's stealth and attack meaning you can't use Blinding Powder preemptively and still retain "will not alert enemies". Double-check testing on my dominator showed that the confuse proc did not have the suppression effect from Mind Control's confuse powers (hitting a boss mag 3, it becoming contagious). Below are some testing situations on my blaster that cover most of the bases. Each of these screen shots was taken around 2 seconds from using Blinding Powder, within the time of stealth suppression: 35.5% stealth is from Shinobi and 30% from stealth Stealth IO was slotted in sprint Shinobi was the other stacking stealth power Attuned Celerity was used for all testing (some testing not shown was done with level 15 Celerity and Unbounded leap) Some testing was also done on level 54 mobs, same behaviors were seen Other toggles were travel / leadership / non-aggro .0.1 - Slotting 1. Minion in group - Sleep, Contagious - Suppressed 2. Minion in group - Sleep, Confuse, Contagious - No suppression (even with contagion spread) 3. Minion in group - Sleep, Confuse - No suppression 4. Boss in group - Sleep, Confuse - No suppression 5. Boss alone - Sleep, Confuse, Contagious - Suppression 6. Group w/ Contagious Confusion - Suppression 7. Group w/out Contagious Confusion - No Suppression 8. Mass confusion w/ Contagious Confusion (Super Speed and Stealth IO in sprint) ------------------------ I did some other testing but these pretty much sum it up.

This is the most realistic take on the change. While I have yet to fully test the changes, there were a lot of negative reactions early in the thread. I have always tried to make Ignite work on my AR blasters. I still take it.. Every. Gosh. Darn. Time. It seems good on paper, but even removing the 'fear' the AoE is non-existent if you use a targeting macro. I used it as a single target power anyway. And I still have to babysit-root the target if there's no controller spamming immob. Take that time away from it's "DPA". That is unrealistic for many enemies / teams not even including late-game content. Novelty is good, but I'd like to use the power and not just hope it works with too much effort. I fall into the trap every time! Anyways, will continue testing with the limited time I have -- giving my thumbs-up though. This feels great so far. GJ HC team.

Alright, after a few days of testing, I’d like to provide my feedback. For context—I am a mostly support player and have played more than a few bubblers over the years. A bubbler was my first character on early live, and the powerset holds a special place in the feels. That being said, it does need some modern updates and glad ya’all are willing to look at it. Here goes: Force Field now, in my view: The set has three main powers to make it work: Deflection Shield Insulation Shield Dispersion Bubble Other powers in the set have unique but non-necessary effects for the set to function minimally in non-situational… situations. Force (Repulsion) Bolt The additional -20% resistance feels tacked on. I don’t notice it too much myself solo, as I’ve always used Force Bolt to get “shizzle” off me. With the recharge increased that function is much harder to use. Also because Knockback is contentious in certain teams, I’d be forced to use a KB/KD IO to get a valuable, spammable single target debuff. I think more can be done here if there is a goal on making it a core power. Dispersion Bubble Great change – this 15 second leave-the-bubble is exactly what this power needed. A set based on enemy position and knowing when and how to use the situational powers makes this signature power matter more. Especially late game (though I have not tested super late game). We all know how people run around. Repulsion Field My feedback here is partially combined with (previously) Force Bubble. As some here have mentioned, positioning with Force Bubble was great. I still take and use it on all of my bubblers. Part of that is the power is a T9 and I want to take T9s because they are supposed to be capstones. Effective as a blaster nuke nowadays (live). However, it was never used (by me) regularly on teams. Whenever I saw a Force Field defender in the wild, they would not use this power 95%+ of the time if they had it. The problem is/was, I had to sacrifice providing my team with [Dispersion Bubble] and me repositioning baddies. I’m supposed to have Repulsion Field and Force Bolt for that. The combination of these powers is expected, but the implementation is WEIRD. The repel ticks way too low (even though it’s the same as force bubble), because if a baddie is running at me the often get in between the ticks – then they hit the repel and KB and fly a million miles away – ESPECIALLY any enemy that hovers. I love that I have a power that creates a safer zones SMALLER than my [Dispersion Bubble], and I can use it to position, but the combination here just does not work. The ticks from Force Bubble worked well because of the high radius. Even on live, people would make it inside the bubble. The ticks need to be a bit stronger. It felt like the internal team did not test this well. That doesn’t give me confidence in this. I LOVE that the radius is smaller than Dispersion Bubble. I can still provide the defense to the front line with careful positioning (albeit very careful) while still providing a zone of Repel. Repulsion (Force) Bomb Some of these changes are standard warranted, some of them just plain confuse me—especially the reductions. Was this power ever over-powered? Erm… Along the lines of the (Res all-) debuff, it is welcomed but feels-even-less-than-tacked-on... similar to Force (Repulsion) Bolt. What, about this power, made anyone think that it needed less effectiveness in stun chance and damage in exchange for a fairly standard (15%)(Res all-) debuff. While the damage and stun were not that impressive before, I am not a fan of even having the stun at a 10% chance. In testing I hardly noticed it. It’s a bonus, not something that could be considered helpful or reliable AT ALL. Even in a 16-mob group scenario, you’ll stun 2 non-boss (rounded up) for a few seconds. What? Regardless, I use the power like I did before don’t feel much more effectiveness. What I LOVE is the change to “vectored knockdown”. While I am still confused on how it actually works, I can slot 1 KB enhancement in this and still KB elite bosses on 4**** ITF (yes, I did test this, RIP my solo test char many times). Dampening (Force) Bubble Personally, I LOVE this change on making a great 55 ft “I’m here now power”. I see a lot of people in this thread have hated on it, but I love it! However, I think the power misses on some key points considering the other changes (or lack of changes) to the rest of the set. This is the only part that warrants the language “revamp” and not just “change”. What I love: The power adds an “umph” most other sets can’t bring It does not aggro enemies when you use it, providing tactical usage Wide area was kept, making it easier for those that wish to keep KB/Repel auras on What I don’t love: It feels “tampered down” with certain numbers Recharge is unforgiving and not welcoming of how you (or I guess me) would play with this power leveling up, or even on max teams If I had the option to pick any T9 from a support set, this is still close to the bottom of the barrel. It’s above Time Bomb and Liquefy (maybe Melt Armor too with it’s recharge), that’s it with a “Revamp” The power simply does not impress. It’s specialty is providing debuff resistance (numbers are fine besides defense) and also debuffing what the enemies do to you (numbers are fine besides defense). The -23.63% Defense for enemies in the field in the patch notes is misleading. It only reduces the defense debuffs done to YOU or TEAMMATEs if the enemy is in the field. Why this number needs to be so so low is beyond me. Especially when you consider the combat modifiers. Defense Debuffs are some of the strongest stacking debuffs enemies have in the game, and at +4 debuff is halved. It doesn’t do much at this number. 21.63% resistance to defense debuffs is comically low. Especially considering Fade exists. I’d rather have Fade on a defender for a T9 as, even enhanced, Dampening Bubble cannot reach that level. Considering combat modifiers come into play, some of these number really fall flat next to other T9’s, especially considering the lackluster changes to other powers. The final issue I have is the 90s recharge. I have to ask “what do you intend”? You are trying to balance this power with low numbers like it can be used like Faraday Cage. Do you intend for this to be used every couple of groups (with SOs)? The recharge makes no sense since it’s supposed to be a pivotal power that has minimal impact from my testing. The power needs something more, whether stronger numbers or additional effects. General Discussion Love the set, still will play it. I think most changes are of good heart and are a good step, but lacking direction and also are a bit weak, tacked on, leaving me confused. Detention Field, one of the least used powers in the game was untouched for whatever reason. In any case, I appreciate the effort. It’s better than it was before, but a missed opportunity. This post is my pure testing feedback from solo and play with 1-2 players. I’ve written / edited as I’ve tested. I won’t respond other than corrections as I’m trying to keep distracting discussion down (I’m bad at that), but I will still read. Just before posting I saw the recent updates to the -ticks- of repel in repulsion field-. Hawt. Take that into account. Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk – peaces.

Replying to my own topic. I guess I misunderstood the slow -special portion. I tested an AE Claws / Regen +2 minion. From power analyzer -- enemy has Fast Healing and Follow Up -- before and after: It is working. However it did not affect the passive buff from Fast Healing, even though the -special regen should overcome the regen resistance in Fast healing I think. Testing with a AE mob that has Integration did see the regeneration from the power go down though. I was confused.

If that's true and -special for slow and not just "slow"... I did not see any effect still on a CoT Behemoth that has movement enhancement powers. I would also expect enemies to actually aggro on me, they did not.

I'll hold off on giving my full feedback for now, because I can't even get the offensive portion of Dampening Bubble to work. Testing in a PI radio and on some rando-grey mobs around the area. Dampening Bubble provided me with the intended benefits, but did nothing to the baddies. I tested both pulling them into the bubble, and forming the bubble right next to enemies. Is anyone else having this problem?

Bolded and Italicized the important point in my mind. This change is a much requested QoL change, but --with current implementation-- it hinders some powers / builds. I don't get why this change needs to be a trade-off. I don't get it at all. Offensive Toggles are already subject to outside effects (level differences). I don't recall a sweeping discussion or penalty when non-offensive toggles were changed on live. As you said, I guess I can live with it. This fervent discussion is great because this is not a balance issue that will be revisited again once finalized (IMO).

I'll add to this. I think Suppression now has an added contingency definition for this Offensive Toggle Change. It used to mean strictly while mezzed for the toggles that qualified in the minds of the live devs when that change was made--Non-offensive toggles. A QoL for when Dark Armor got stunned and the like. With this change there's a conditional aspect based on the toggle's nature. So suppression is a bit confusing. But I think of it like Ham. Can be honey-cured or smoked. Or just roasted. Confusing? Yes. Still ham. And my forbears would get me to eat any of those either which-way. --These comments are apart from whether or not it should remain as is <3--

Gotterdammerstupiddung or something close to that. I tried the same I couldn't get it to trigger either in two attempts. I checked City of Data... I couldn't find it. I could swear though. SWEAR there's a nasty stun there in the arena. Maybe I'm just getting old in my 30s. Anyways, if it can be confirmed. I'd hate for the OG poster's concerns for a real bug to go undocumented. Edit: It's you!!