Akisan

Archery main here - totally in favor of a buff to the set, as it feels a bit left behind (especially after the other Blaster nukes became crashless). A few thoughts for possible ways to make the set more iconic: "Armor piercing" a.k.a. bonus damage to certain enemy groups. Modern ballistic armor is designed to stop modern weapons, so it tends to do well against bullets, but doesn't do very well against arrows. This would also nicely address the problem the set has with seemingly everything resisting it at level 50 (yay, pure Lethal!) Secondary Effects. A few people mentioned slows or bleeding being appropriate. I'd petition for a small amount of -MaxHP, as it's a unique effect (and could represent a mix of things, like arrow weight, loss of mobility, blood loss, etc.) Either way, it could be a chance for a random effect (50% chance for any one of several debuffs, at power-dependent weightings), or implemented as a specific one (like Aimed Shot and Ranged shot always inflict a bleeding DoT) Critical hits, scaled against (uncapped) chance to hit. 0% crit rate at 100% to-hit, scaling up to 10% at 300% to-hit. I'd probably cap this at 20% (500% to-hit, encourages further team buffs), but it'd be fair to cap this at 10% (equal to Scrappers). For reference, my uncapped to-hit is generally between 200 and 250% against even-con enemies (without Aim/Build-up, so 5-7.5% crit chance depending on power). (I'd also be okay with a flat crit rate, similar to Scrappers) And yeah, as stated earlier in the thread - Archery's two main "gimmicks" are the crashless nuke (which everyone has now), and 1.15x base accuracy (compared to other weapon sets' 1.05x), which is... mostly useless in end-game (it *does* affect your to-hit floor, but that doesn't come up often). A new secondary effect would definitely help with set identity beyond "feeling medieval". (And I'd still like to customize both the fletching on my arrows *and* the flame on Blazing Arrow, btw)

No thank you. Compared to the legacy base salvage system (which I really miss because of the lost lore), the IO system is already very generic. Plus, it has no intermediate crafting steps or chances to fail, so that alone is a huge step in simplicity over many other games. I'm not sure about how "incredibly difficult it is to show new players". CoH is one of the few games where *anyone* can be (and is expected to be) a Crafter. In many MMOs with any sort of detailed crafting tree, there tends to be dedicated Crafters in any Guild/Clan/etc., those few people that dedicate themselves to making equipment instead of fighting. Whether it's build dependent, or player knowledge (or patience!) dependent, it comes out the same: Many of the characters in a guild will not participate in the crafting system (very basic stuff aside). Also, CoH is still not "equipment based". In an equipment based game, our appearances *and* enhancements are tied to the equipment we're wearing. In those games, everyone at a certain content level is going to look more or less the same, as they'll pretty much all be wearing the (same) appropriate armor for that content. As an aside, I'm actually glad that this is less true these days, with many games offering vanity armors & effects, but for a long time there...

Fully IO'd controllers have earned that containment damage, especially if they *didn't* PL through the low levels to get to their pets. (I still remember trying to solo a controller to 14 in Issue 3. 0/10, do not recommend.) 100% this, but I'd consider adding Sleeps to this set-up as well. And yes, this would work much better as an option to buff Containment - other ATs get Holds with their damage (instead of damage with their Holds), and don't have to rely on having stuff Held to deal competitive damage.

It depends on rank - the minions are brown, the bosses are green. (Tuatha's a good match for this theme though!) And why not have it be a zone event where he shows up with a bunch of Red Caps - he shows up as a "Giant" monster (regular Bres sized, but GM stats) somewhere in the zone, but while the event is active, all "Nice" presents spawn Red Caps instead! (Event ends when he is defeated, or after a certain amount of time)

And how long would this interaction be? What would the cooldown on it be? My holds last for 30s, and have a 6-8s cooldown. Ice Manipulation's hold is already melee, and my archery powers have a 130ft range, so I wouldn't lose *any* positioning doing this. On top of that, with the exception of a few Lts (Crey tanks come to mind), it's almost always going to be faster for me to just use my regular attacks to defeat said Lts unless that interaction is only a second or so.

Not in favor of this plan - AoE mezzes can already be quite powerful when used correctly. (As a side note, Stalkers get a 20% Crit chance against Held and Slept players, so this is somewhat implemented for them) Brawl. With a confirmation roll. At a penalty. (If it *had* to be implemented...) Perhaps not, but there's a chance to be interrupted and said opportunity only exists during a very narrow window. Can't exactly call it a "narrow window" - My blaster can keep a pair of +4 bosses Held. Permanently. Being able to kill a Lt. every 4 to 5 seconds with just the hold + brawl would be a rather nice damage boost, especially since I'm Archery and so many enemies resist Lethal damage. (I hate Crey soooo much...)

I'd rather take Bowler - enemies you KB can KB enemies they hit while flying, and both deal and receive damage on impact. Special - chaining 10 KB/KDs in this way grants bonus damage for a few seconds. That said, while this could be fun for RP, there's a lot of potential cases where an envisioned character doesn't "fit" their race's stats. I'd much rather leave that sort of thing blank and/or up to the imagination, instead of having to hand-wave it away every time. (Not to mention the serious munchkin potential here. Any munchkin worth their loot can make pretty much any downside rarely/never matter.)

We also get them at level 2 now (instead of 14+ and 20+), which is a huge buff.

Would it be possible to have out-levelled contacts offer to automatically exemplar you on entering their missions (to the mission's max level, of course). This would more or less prevent you from truly outlevelling arcs, but still allows you to gain levels and take new contacts. This could be done on a contact to contact basis, or even globally opted in/out of via the general xp options.

This would also help with some enemy groups too - late-game factions like Malta and Arachnos have CC-happy leutenants, and Talons of Vengeance & Carnies have really dangerous bosses. Being able to target those specifically without custom binds for each faction would be very, very useful.

A) And? I'd hope that he'd be aware of such a double standard now, and work towards fixing it. And he may not have more, they just may be more visible since he posts more. B) You're right, I don't. My problem wasn't with the solutions that have been offered (most of them anyways, some of the ones in this thread are rather insulting). I have issues with the tone in which they were offered. C) You did ask why I responded to your post, and not his. You may not agree with that reason, but it is what it is. D) He's not calling us out because we don't agree with him, he's calling us out because of how we responded to his suggestion. E) As for targeting you specifically, it's just bad luck. You aren't the only one in here belittling him, but you are the most recent. That, and I seem to be somewhat moody this morning, so, sorry for taking that out on you. I don't usually get involved in "tonecop" stuff, as I'm not a mod, and it's not my place to do so. (But still, it's not okay to be condescending towards someone, as it's a clear sign of disrespect)

I'd vote for Knife over Spear Throw. Knives are small, concealable, and more thematic for a quick ranged attack. Spears may be a better weapon (with fewer temp powers granting them), but they're not something I would expect many natural/gadget heroes to carry around with them.

A) He's calling us out as a whole. We, as a group, have been applying some double standards to what we (dis-)approve of (which is hypocrisy). Part of that is because there's multiple people, and thus multiple view-points for proposed solutions, but even so... our response to "should something be an option or not" seems to vary (wildly, sometimes), depending on whether we would use said option or not. B) His comment did provoke further discussion. Whether he meant it to or not, it was helpful to the discussion. C) He's already been responded to (and responded back). I try not to run circular call-backs and derailments in threads. If I disagreed, or had something new to add to his statement or those replies, I would have. D) Your comment was targeting him. Commenting about the group's behavior is very different from singling out a member for their opinion.

While generally true, 44 (the blaster @Rudra used as an example) is possibly the worst level for that, since you can only find +6's for that. And some of that timeframe will be based on a toon's inherent defenses - a blaster with no defenses will go down a lot faster than a blaster with 20-30% Ranged/AoE defense from their sets (can't be de-toggled). Especially if they don't fight back. (As an aside, +6's only get a 5% to-hit bonus, so defense is still pretty effective against them) I remember that era in gaming, when some really bad "gaming safety" systems were added. Not all are bad, but it's the thought that counts... And wakies still grant 10s of Debt protection - just enough that it can be difficult to optimize how often the group downs you. And yet, it would still be convenient to have for certain toons (RP, as well as mechanical work-arounds). Again, I have a Silver Age toon that does not want the extra xp (as Patrol XP didn't exist then), and a couple toons that are "level pacted", and I'd appreciate not having to play with my Disable/Enable XP toggle every time we get close to leveling. (and, @espectro, intentional or not, you're coming off as rather condescending here. Please be more careful with your tone, insulting people isn't helpful in an honest discussion) While it would probably be a (somewhat) quick fix, simply a menu option or two (enable/disable patrol xp gain and/or conversion), @GM Crumpet did already state that we're very unlikely to get this, as only a few of us are likely to use this option. Unfortunate, but it's nice to have confirmation.

Yep, still agree that these need a buff of some kind, whether it be by greatly increasing the base effect, or adding side utility as has been suggested. (Old thread on this topic linked below). All inspirations have specific situations you should be using them in, and Luck/Sturdy are both survivability boosters - except that Lucks are at least twice as powerful, in *nearly all* cases. And I would also make a distinction here - Oranges should not grant any Mez resistance, that's what Break Frees are for.

+1 on the 4th build slot here - I've Team, Solo, Base Building/Exploring, and would love one for Hardmode.

I could see a few defeat most/all badges being added here and there. Would definitely have to be careful though, some of those could end up as a real slog to get (like trying that in the MLTF, no thank you...)

I'd counter-proposal this to "nerf lucks". Endurance drain resistance is *very* situational, but a medium luck will stop half of incoming damage, assuming no existing defenses on the character. (It obviously won't stop a defense cascade, but most late- game toons have 20+% defense, at which point a medium luck will stop nearly all incoming damage & debuffs)

Little glowing pool of ectoplasm under where they were standing/floating? I remember hating that power on my Empath. I ended up getting in the habit of targeting them through shift+# targeting, which was *super* awkward to get used to. And even then, the targeting box would "flicker" and de-target them half the time.

While the stats themselves would be very interesting to see, and could even be useful feedback for fine-tuning a build, I don't like how this could open us up to elitism. I've been on too many MMOs (and other games) where group leads would look through player stats and/or equipment lists before adding them to a party or raid (one of them even mentioned a specific armor piece as being mandatory for the raid he was forming. It drops in that raid, and was why I was trying to join it.) If this were implemented, I'd definitely like these stats to be only visible by the player that earned them, with no rewards/badges associated with them. Definitely no badges. I do *not* want to try to get a primary healer badge on my main (Archery/Ice/Fire Blaster). And on the reward side, could you even balance support rewards for stuff like an Empath vs. a bubbler vs. a controller or dom? That said, your "baseball card" idea for showing off team accomplishments could be really fun, and there'd likely be some (well-earned) bragging rights threads over them here on the forums. I would also add the following metrics added to your stat spread: - Damage mitigated (from buffs.) The game already partially keeps track of this, as we get "Avoided" over our heads whenever an attack misses because of a Luck inspiration. - Damage prevented (through CCs) <- this would be very hard to code, if not impossible. - % of Enemies CC'd (by rank, and as a percentage of fight time.) As an example, if there's 3 EBs in the TF, and only one's held for 3/4 of their fight, there would be a 25% here. - Number of teammates saved (either through retaking aggro, healing, CC, or providing a buff that lets them survive when they wouldn't have. And yes, defeat is a CC here.) - Venge bait moments (much more subjective, and just for fun.) Almost all of us have jumped in at least once when we really shouldn't have. I'd only count this if you jump a group and die very quickly (within 5s of combat starting), and your team doesn't manage to engage within that time.

Wow, didn't expect that much anti-powercreep sentiment over this suggestion. Inspirations are supposed to be cheap, temporary consumables designed to help a hero overcome difficult (or otherwise impossible) challenges. It's fine if they're powerful, we're not supposed to have them up all the time. (If we are, I'd be suggesting a rather large nerf to the luck series of inspirations). Adding resistance to a rarer debuff to either blue or orange inspirations is a good QoL change, powercreep or not, kinda like how we don't have Iron Will inspirations anymore. Of the two inspirations to add this to, I'd favor adding it to the oranges. While End. debuff resistance would be thematically appropriate for blues to have, debuff resistance could become what oranges are known for. We could add even resistances for the dubuffs @biostem mentioned too. Maybe we'll have a reason to carry them then, as, while some end-heavy builds carry blues, most of us view oranges as trash (because they are, except for a few, very specific, cases). Oh, and as a side note for those of you saying builds should have a hole, and inspirations either shouldn't, or only partially cover that weakness: it'd be interesting to hear your thoughts on squishies carrying break frees, or lowbies carrying around a half-dozen lucks for the EB at the end of some arcs.

I'd be all for adding a bunch of debuff resistances to the orange inspirations, they're quite underpowered compared to their purple counterparts. I even had an old suggestion topic about that, including comparisons:

That'd be the reason I would like it for my Silver Age character. My current work-around with him is that the first half of every mission I play with him is with xp off, so long as he still has patrol xp. (50% xp + 50% xp + mission bonus is roughly 150% of total mission xp.) Not very exact though, as mission lengths can vary wildly, and the mission bonus isn't always proportional to the length. Also, I'd definitely have to back off to 33-40% of the mission with no xp if I ran above +0x0, since the bonus doesn't scale with difficulty rating. Not last I checked. You can get debt in those zones if an NPC defeats you, but not from other players.

I would also like this option, even if it is an option that a very small fraction of the player base uses (and even then, only a few of mine would use it). And, BTW: RP, Challenge, Accessibility, or even just Philosophical Preference don't seem like "weird" reasons to me. We've given valid reasons to include this option (even though, again, not many people are likely to use it). This, or a setting in Menu/Options/General, along with Earn XP and XP while Exemplared. Can't promise on that programming length though, given the (hopefully less-so now) spaghettified codebase. Depending on if patrol xp is awarded to offline characters, or awarded on log-in, they may have to either add an if block to stop the patrol xp award, or to add debt equal to the awarded patrol xp (though the 2nd option would make the debt badges really easy to get...).

I'll second this. I've a couple pseudo- level pact toons with someone that occasionally plays, and it's obnoxious toggling xp on and off to stay at their level after they've burned their patrol xp. (they usually have to do a little bit of catch up, at most a couple bars or so, but still...) I've also got a couple of toons that would definitely use this for RP reasons, one of which is a Silver Age toon (no P2W, IOs, new arcs, xp disable, travel power at 14, etc.) So happy he finally made 22, so I can slot SOs instead of burning them. He'd also love an option to disable the global incarnate xp/drops (when he gets there), but that's a topic for another thread.