Monos King

Always love to see tempnpower suggestions. I will note villains get so many other temp powers than the other sides, that this is probably why they refrained from giving bills temps in that newer arc. I personally believe most arcs should award a temp of some sort for immersion though.

Okay...so. Follow up to this one. Now that the absorb from Frostwork has been set to correctly replace, I started doing my main tests: fighting AVs. +4, and with small amounts of surrounding mobs. Build 1 is a demons/cold MM with capped res, but only 27% meaningful def. Build 2 uses soft-cap defense, and lower resistance. The pets have 58% AoE defense in both scenarios. I use Positron and BABs because most other AVs aren't a threat to this build even petless. Build 1 (Res) AV Fighting Oh my goodness. It is worse. It is so much worse. All of the issues I had anticipated were in full display, as well as a few others I hadn't even considered. Fighting AVs with even a little bit of AoE is just waaaay worse, so any tanking capability just got hit hard. Positron, who is quite the menace for MMs to be fair, was killing my pets via doing damage to me. When the demons had max HP (which again, doesn't ignore BG mode), I would only ever need to summon at most one Cold Demonling (he hates those), with rebirth saving me when he uses his whopper -recharge ability. But with the absorb change? I simply cannot protect them enough. I have no heals, and when they die, they die. What about re-applying absorb? How did that play in? To use it effectively, you use Frostwork on each minion before the fight. This is the same with absorb and +HP. What happened is that I quickly discovered that while re-application sounds nice in a vacuum, it just isn't diddly when enemies use recharge debuffs. Back Alley Power Punch was far worse to fight against than on live. As was his whole moveset. Positron, with his recharge death ability, took away any meaning or value that Frostwork had everytime he used it, as I couldn't click on it during its downtime. Once the absorb was damaged off..it was off. Positron is an extreme example, though, so I also tested against Galaxy's (not too bad but worse than when it was max HP, has its own issues), Cabal (reallly, reaaaally unpleasant), and Arachnoids (I'm not even going to speak about how unpleasant that was). Before, when fighting heavy -rech guys, I was mostly fine. I only needed to worry when Frostworks duration wore off. Now, if the absorb shield is off due to damage, I have to scramble to try and re-apply it to whichever pet is taking damage. The other pets, also taking damage, are slowly losing absorb while I apply absorb to pets individually one at a time, rather than being able to naturally regen back up to a health level where they won't be one shot, or being healed by the ember demon. The trade-off for being able to better protect a single henchman is waaaay not worth the tedium of having to keep reapply the absorb to these squishy lil punks. It was essentially the same experience as when I use Aid Other in a build, but worse. And furthermore, even that advantage was just completely gone when fighting AVs or hard hitting mobs with AoE. Absorb ignores bodyguard mode. Absorb ignores bodyguard mode. IT IGNORES IT! You get a Back Alley Power Punch, and that's a wrap. Keep in mind, for every 100 DMG the MM takes, each pet is taking 50. The minion pet only has 574 health base, and losing a pet increases the damage they take by 14%. I was getting flung out there. The more res heavy build is practically a dud for fighting AVs like that now. It's really, really not good. Build 2 (Def) AV Fighting So, yeah, the change invalidates my preferential up close and personal fighting style. What if I just cheese it and go full Hover, Soft Cap def? Well first off, Positron can fly. My pets cannot. And, everyone already knows that being able to fly will make you take much less damage, that tactic isn't really relevant in a discussion about power improvement. Here I went up close and personal, just with higher def, lower res, and lower damage. IT SUCKED. Like, it was better in some ways. Positron hit me much less, so the pets didn't get as much damage. The same with Back Alley Brawler. But eventually they did; they hit me with an AoE, this AoE also hit the pets, and it was just a one shot. Full wipe, besides myself. Likely aided by my lower res in the defense trade-off. Being able to protect that one or two pets longer is vastly inferior to being able to protect your whole crew longer, which is what Max Health represents. When the whole henchmen set up is taking damage slowly, which takes off all of their absorb at a "manageable rate", you are still left with the need to reapply absorb to EVERYONE, even if Frostworks 1m duration isn't over. This makes your pets really in danger for a while. Meanwhile, Mr MaxHP keeps everyone nice and steady for the whole duration, and they can heal back up to that value without being swatted by BG damage, or interrupted by recharge debuffs. And they *will* heal, if you can protect them. Thugs is the only set with no heal baked in, and they've got other things going on for them. Your pets will also most likely have AT IOs, giving some regen. Testing the changes in content with lower damage enemies, Absorb frostwork wasn't too bad. I would argue it was in fact, a little better. Zombies benefits hard from this, seeing as they get max health buffs already. For every other set, this is really only while they aren't actually in that much danger. I didn't test Hamidon or Crimson or enemies like that because the results would be obvious: they literally ignore absorb. Obviously worse in those cases. I have yet to test out with ninjas, bots, or wolves. Based off of my understanding of the sets, bots will do better with max HP in all instances due to defense and heals, wolves will be a bit better with absorb, and ninjas will require me to see directly. Tl;dr after doing further testing in my natural element, with it behaving as intended, I have to be more adamant. This is a very bad change for most MMs. Absorb needs to start noticing Bodyguard mode at the very least before MaxHP is replaced with it on a set with no heals.

That's it; dom version is incorrect. Controller version has the original description of Telekinesis, and needs an updated description. Controller version of Levitate is how it should be. Dom Telekinesis is wrong, and dom Levitate isn't using the updated description. And neither mention the auto shutdown. So all of them need to get that included besides Psionic Mastery, which seems to be fine.

Dominator Levitate is missing archetype enhancement category and cannot slot them (I forgot that you need mez to slot those around these parts). Dominator and Controller Telekinesis are missing all enhancement set categories. Controller Levitate is missing the categories for Controller Archetype enhancements. (Same as above)

I know there was version of this power that actually does fight and is targetable. I can't see why we can't just have that version...seems pretty fair for the effort of collecting the recipe and assembling it (as well as you know facing Hamidon). In fact, if I'm being honest, it's kind of lame to only get a blob that does nothing and is so rare. I've always felt the rewards for Hamidon were lackluster and indistinct. If you get something that's actually somewhat useful it'd be better. Not to mention, we have a ton of vanity pets right now, if anything should be a real reward, I think it should go to the Hami bud. Their powers aren't even that strong, but it's just much cooler and more worthwhile if it does fight.

Currently using the (new) description for levitate.

I wonder how a power like this would work. Presumably the goal is to lower the activation time, so something that just uses powexec or something similar wouldn't fit. It would be possible to create a new "Set the Board" power that checks which MM summons the player owns, as well as their level, and summons the appropriate pets instantly. However, the pets summoned by this power wouldn't have the same enhancements as your normal pets. Maybe if each individual MM pet summon got a second version with zero activation time which could only be accessed via the Set The Board power, this could work. Similar to how enhanced water jet and the fast titan weapon powers work. This could probably do it. In either case, it's quite a bit of time. Creating a duplicate of every MM primary summon in the game, creating the power that checks if you have each power and your level and summons the pets, possibly both and more stuff I haven't considered. The idea has my good will, although it might end up being more work than it's worth.

A bit off topic in this forum, but they've been doing pretty good revising the sets. I do also still have concerns myself though. I'm curious what you had in mind, you should post your ideas to the Suggestions Forum if you haven't already.

Hahaha I can imagine. You writers are all wearing capes...I've lightly tried my hand at mission creation and honestly the simplest part was actually coming up with the stories. Then actually making it work is a Task Force in its own right. With how often things don't want to show up I'd swear I missed some kind of NPC union strike. You guys ever want the extra hands or help from me, I'd be very enthusiastic to pitch in with all that. Either way, I can tell it's already in good hands!

Not sure if this is intentional, but tranq is stating to use lethal defense rather than toxic defense (and also is listed under Assault Rifle for that matter).

My only gripe with this is that I don't think enemies running on nictus fragments should be as powerful as or act as counterparts to the PPD dudes, who are actually fully merged with Kheldians. Also War wolves are already like...failed nictus fragment infusions, so it's kinda weird that they could also get the nictus powers here. That's all, could probably just change their descriptions if anyone cares enough to be aligned with the lore there. I don't have a lot of stake in the council conversation. Edit: Also, the AoE rez might be better off on a chance per person hit basis. It's still auto hit, but only 20% chance to damage and heal or something. If it hits an entire group it's still very like to revive, but it could be better received. It would also be in line with making them a PPD analogue.

It's definitely not working on Cryonic Final Radial Judgement at the moment. Nor Void. Probably safe to say it's not triggering at this moment.

It's been a while since I've been active on Homecoming. Haven't touched the servers much, the forums even less. So coming in now, it's kind of like a mix in perspective between the total newcomers and the veterans. There's been a lot of excitement, but nothing is perfect. I remember how things were, so I think it's time for someone to finally balance some of that enthusiasm with a realistic outlook. This is the feedback section, after all. The Current State of Homecoming Missions and Storylines Let's take a look at this here...Mender Valen. Apparently she's supposed to connect to some other contacts, which just seems to be an excuse not to make original storyline content. Not impressed so far. I'm looking at how this is supposed to connect to Laura Lockhart, things didn't go to well in that arc. Keep playing through missions, normal, normal, did this before, did this before and- Oh. Oh shit. You can change the fate of the character? You can use Ouroboros for what everyone would have always expected you to use it for, and actually change the timeline? This is way too cool. It's legitimately better than content in the original game. You can time travel using Ouroboros to get unique outcomes? Seriously? Alright, I guess that one passes the test. HC: 1. Apparently that's old news though. Going to need a bit more. Alright, well what about this Aeon Task Force? What's that about? A recognizably fodder, weakling low tier level group is now relevant? That's clearly stupid and would never work. Surely there's no way that they could add challenge in a way that is both sensible to the lore and also actually makes use of existing powers. Surely there's no way that they would create Smelters and unique currency, and new enhancements, and set up plot point after plot point in an interdimensional adventure that includes both space and time...and that's exactly what's happening right now. Wow. Yeah, the bait post ends here. I was won over as soon as I got to beat up Flambeaux. I usually call her something a lot less kind than beaux. There is so much to unravel there I couldn't even believe it. The lore additions, the amazing maps, the flow, the dialogue, this: And that's only one of many storylines that was added. Kheldian lore is my bread and butter, and seeing Requiem have time in the limelight was fantastic. Similarly, Void Harbingers were just...excellent. I think the crowning jewel of it all is the absolute chaos of plotwist and time skips that is Dr. Stribbling. I could not be more happy with how storyline creation is going. The only thing that's lacking is end-game storylines that advance the overall plot but..I'm sure we'll get there. Also on the topic of things I like Masterminds I think no one would smile harder than me and Galaxy Brain with those Robotics changes that were added. I mean, it felt like HC took them straight from our propositions. They are awesome. Robots feel like murder machines currently, while retaining the debuffs they were known for in a good way. And don't even get me started on necromancy. That ones just super cool. No other power plays like that. It's a different approach...but I like it. Challenge Settings Are splendid. I realize some the implementation is controversial, looking over some of the old threads. But it ended up being exactly in line with some of the concepts I was looking for in one of the threads cited in my signature. Optional, but valuable. Incentive is there to play them. They encourage more diverse team play, and have mechanics that you'd really be best with support if you wanted to survive. The Nictus stealing your body is just sooooooooooo fun to see and Actually that reminds me of something else. EMPEROR ROMULUS AUGUSTUS He drank from the well, becoming a quick incarnate. He trained his whole life as an elite cimeroran warrior. He's 12 feet tall. And on top of all that...he's the first Nictus-Human merger in history. This guy should be the big bingo, an elite who is at a level of power everyone should want to be. And he just sucks, he sucks so much in the ITF. I feel more threatened clipping my own nails than fighting him. And lore wise this is even more true...technically he should be capable of drawing upon two wells. That's something else altogether though. So seeing him in his proper glory, as an emperor and incarnate thats freely using black holes and attracting the attention of the Talons of Vengeance was excellent on very many levels. Bravo to everyone involved there. I'm seeing revamps to zones, expanding them and showing everyone that the team doesn't forget about content just because it isn't end game or level 50. I'm seeing QoL changes that are so good it makes jumping to another server feel like deportation. I'm seeing new powers like Storm Blast no one even knew they wanted. And of course, I can't forget that their actually developers like Boop and Fault that actually remember PvP exists and has a playerbase. And again, the storylines and dialogue are just stupendous. So really, I just wanted to say to the Homecoming team you guys are awesome, and I love you all. I've had some pretty depressing things to deal with lately, but I have friends here that help push me through it. We wouldn't have CoH if it weren't for all of you. Even a serial server hopper like me sees that. There's really nothing like the effort and work you all are putting into what was, until recently (nice!) a rogue server. Looks like everything is going as strong as ever. Keep up the good work guys.

This didn't happen to include Assault Radial's Double Hit did it?

It'll definitely be worth testing again once the next mini patch is passed and Frostwork is properly re-applying instead of ignoring. The performance looks abysmal right now as a result of that, much worse than it should. Right now the absorb doesn't even have the advantage over +HP it should.

Hi, it's been a while. I greatly appreciate the work and sentiment behind the Frostwork re-evaluation, that power should be getting some love. However, I desperately despise the change from max HP to absorb. Now in spite of my feelings, it's not all bad, but if a buff was the intention it falls short - especially for Masterminds. I talked to a few others who may have echoed some of these points here a little while ago, but I think it's a good idea to go over the benefits and detriments so that everyone understands my perspective. Absorb Vs Max HP Both act a pseudo resistance; a 10% absorb or 10% HP buff will cause you to die 10% slower. Say you have 2000 HP and are struck with 2000 pts of solid dmg. At base, you will now have 1 HP (since players can't get one shot). If you are given a 50% absorb bonus, you now have an additional 1000 health and are left with the same. If you are given a 50% MAX HP bonus, the same happens. Absorb Benefits 1. Allows you to expand your max HP The absorb cap is equal to the base HP cap of whichever AT is being buffed (including pets, NPCs, you name it). Tanks can receive up to 5,408.028 HP with full absorb, something elite Bio builds will often find themselves with. For pet henchmen who have pitifully tiny max HP caps, absorb consistently offers better survival...on paper. 2. Protects you against Percentage Based Damage This is pretty huge, and a strong argument in absorbs favor in any situation. Attacks like Marauder's Nova Fist, Tyrant's Flow Lightning, Diaboliques Earthshatter, Penelope Yin's psionic Drift and various other abilities from challenge content attack your HP directly, making HP buffs entirely useless. Nova Fist in particular sets players to about 1HP, as it does 99% of your health. Absorb will cushion this greatly. 3. Can be re-applied Old Frostwork will offer you the big max HP, but further usages won't help you. Absorb offers a shield that can be re-added once it falters. This allows it to act like resistance, as well as like a heal. 4. Can come in small, reapplying DoTs This is a testament to the versatility of absorb. Instantly reapplying absorb could prevent taking dmg below a certain threshold *at all*, but primarily the current state it is used in for powers like Spirit Ward is very helpful because 5. Absorb can be Power Boosted Which, in the rare instances of such a power being added, allows for a good synergy permitting the small DoTs to become much larger absorb shields. However, Absorb Issues 1. Absorb can be weakened Attacks that deal -HP such as Crimsons abilities naturally weaken the strength of absorb as well. The only way to counteract Crimson and his godlike -HP is with HP buffs of your own. Once your max HP is set to 10, absorb isn't helping you at all. You'll get like 1 Absorb. Furthermore, in the instance you are fighting something with -special, should that exist, it's worth noting your absorb benefits would be affected as well - assuming it was your own click power. As far as I know, -special would not affect the buffs you receive from others. 2. Bodyguard mode and many other abilities bypass Absorb You may have heard this on the discord, I was informing people of this fact for a hot second. It's my biggest gripe; absorb is not perfect. Hamidon's attacks, some of Crimsons, various many challenge abilities and zone/object triggered effects all ignore absorb outright. This is especially troublesome for masterminds who are already struggling to keep pets alive on a regular basis. But most importantly, Bodyguard mode damage split ignores absorb. If you are taking the brunt of the damage, using absorb on your pets literally does nothing. You've wasted a power. For the other mastermind secondaries like elec affin and Nature, yyou also have plentiful healing to circumvent this issue. Not so with cold domination. Running my demons/cold, I actually had to start clicking Rebirth occasionally when the pets health got low with this change. My pets personal survival was a bit better if I had them attack, but that's not exactly useful when I'm fighting AVs that will one shot them regardless. 3. Has to be reapplied I'll reference Frostwork specifically here. While the benefits of reapplication were discussed earlier, the fact that it *has* to be reapplied is really no good for a single target power like Frostwork. Max HP offers a hands-off approach, you use it and then for the duration of the power, your target has enhanced regeneration and can be brought back up to the their new cap naturally. You can do this which each teammate, or pet. However, with absorb, once the benefit has been tacked off from damage, that is it. Frostwork is now useless until it next recharges, and since it is single target you are either forced to sit and use it on the person who needs it most like a heal, rather than drop it and move onto the next. 4. Faaar more common than +HP (Lengthier, check my math) Now for Max HP. Max HP Benefits 1. Is Permanent Max HP bonuses do not need to be applied once you lose the extra health you were given. Until the duration of the power has expended, you simply keep the HP bonus. This is important when you are using, say, a Single target 1 minute recharge ability and have to apply it to over 7 pets, or have teammates split across that you cannot constantly attend to. 2. Allows you to overcome the regen cap Essentially, whatever the percentage of HP you just gained, you also gained additional regeneration of equal amount. This is effectively allowing you to overcome the Regen cap. 3. Cannot be weakened or bypassed This is very helpful when fighting debuff heavy enemies, or the likes of Crimson. There do not exist any debuffs as of now that weaken MAX HP buffs. This is super important for masterminds. 4. Unique The simple fact is, Max HP buffs are extremely rare as support powers. They have extreme utility in the lower levels, and offer new avenues to face enemies that would be otherwise quite difficult. Max HP Issues 1. One and Done You cannot make use of Max HP once it is applied more than once. They don't stack, and even if they did, the HP cap will have been achieved. Furthermore, unlike absorb, it cannot be used as a pesudo heal. 2. Percentage Based Attacks Ignore Max HP Buffs Regardless of what you do, Nova Fist will take you to 1HP. 3. Maxed out characters find themselves at the HP Cap There are a lot of set bonuses and temps that increase your HP cap, so in end game content, absorb is seemingly better. It is worth noting, however, end game content is also where all of those powers that ignore and weaken absorb show up to begin with. Furthermore, most armors are still not reaching said HP caps. The Take-Away I look at this through the lenses of a mastermind and a scrapper, but I do consider every AT in the game. Even so: Absorb is better when used on a mastermind, but worse when used by a mastermind. If an MM were to have Frostwork used on them, generally speaking, it will be better for bodyguard mode because now the pets don't take any damage at all. However, this is a rarer instance. If you are a mastermind, you are focused on supporting your pets, and so while the absorb will be stronger than max HP for them, they are literally benefitting nothing when BG damage hits them. They are taking Hamidon's damage raw, along with many others. Because this isn't purely an absorb vs max HP conversation, and is instead a "which is better for Cold Domination" conversation, I have to argue that the benefits this single target power of Frostwork are just much higher when as a MAX HP power. The current limitations of Frostwork and Cold Dom make it better tailored to be max HP, and not an absorb power. It's also just mechanically misaligned. Cold dom's point is to make the team take less damage through defense, and debuffing enemies. It cripples enemies so the team can spread out and destroy. It has long last duration buffs to contribute to this task. Giving it a buff that inherently demands of the Cold Dom user to tail and reapply crushes the spirit of the independent playstyle that it cultivates. You're supposed to buff them, and then they go off and do their own thing. Absorb isn't allegiant to that mechanic. And again, Bodyguard mode ignores absorb. This is terrible for masterminds. Cold Dom has no healing to supplement. If nothing else, Frostwork is a screaming sponsor to the notion that Mastermind secondaries should get different treatment for certain powers than other Archetypes get, taking from the example of Detonator from traps. There is definitely a better way to address this power.

Hellstar was a fixture in the Freedom community long ago, and had made a brief return to Homecoming, being the reason I learned about Homecoming to begin with. In fact, Hellstar was the reason I played City of Heroes at all, learned how to type by playing this game, and began to explore complicated scientific concepts. That is because Hellstar was in fact a character played by by father. I always thought this outfit was stupid, and often inquired as to why he was even playing a female character when I was younger. Something something I don't want to look at a man lmao. He seemed to have a storyline in his head with it. With his various Hellstar characters, he was amongst the first to engage in a successful Freedom Hami raid, and had over 58 level 50s as early as 2008, going on to eventually lead the Bounty Hunters R Us Supergroup in its heyday. From the hours he poured in from start to finish, and the bonding we had while he did, it was clear he loved City of Heroes. He was there in the games final hours, before the plug was pulled. Sadly, he loved another thing nearly as much as City of Heroes - smoking. Lung cancer took him out of the fight. Towards the end of his life, our relationship wasn't exactly positive. He wasn't the best. But I always remembered the moments we had in this game. It brought us together. I wasn't able to be by his side when the plug was pulled on him. So I'll leave this post in remembrance instead. I didn't always like you dad. But I still love you.

Utterly unacceptable. Terms of Service typo discovered. Shut it all down, NCSoft. (In fact there's two)

I vaguely recall posting this a few years back, but in the event I did not I'll just revive the topic. Thugs Bruiser possesses an enhanceable Hold bonus from Knockout Blow, but does not accept Hold enhancement set IOs. It's been this way for years. Would love to see this remedied.

Good show old boy.

Oh interesting, good suggestion. I did look and it is doing the damage tick. But it is not applying the -def on players, or on NPCs.

I've been at this for a while, it's probably just a bug with the continuous refresh. There aren't any mechanisms in PvP that would cause this, so we most likely need dev intervention. I'll also check to see if this occurs in PvE. Edit: It does. The -def is not affecting NPCs either.

That is the case, however each of these ticks is supposed to be a 100% chance. The -defense should be applying throughout the 15 seconds. Similar powers usually show this. My target did not move, and I monitored not the combat attributes, but my own To-Hit chance initially, which is how I discovered this. Even while attacking non-stop with extremely short animation time powers, my chance to hit never rose while the target was in the puddle, just as the targets defense never updated. If this is a glitch not in performance, but a byproduct of its design, it's still not working as it should. Although, it seems that it's just not applying -def.

The Experimentation pool power Corrosive Vial is not properly applying -Defense in PvP, and possibly in other settings as well. My Chance to hit before and during usage of Corrosive Vial did not change. Here is the defense on the character that had Corrosive Vial used on them: Before After The power shows up in the Base Defense category, but does not actually apply to any of the defense types, leaving it unchanged. Occasionally the debuff does show up, but only for a second, and still does no affect defense even during that second.

Pets summon from villain epic pools are taunting enemies as a result of Gauntlet, taking away aggro from the user. In Pulling situations, and especially PvP situations, this bug makes a huge mess of things. (Note: This bug was discovered on beta).