Steampunkette

A mastermind without their ninja (or thugs, or mercenaries, etc) is soon to follow them. But in the media, that's not exactly true. The conservation of ninja, whether heroic or villainous, clearly indicates that the fewer ninja on the battlefield, the stronger and more skilled the remaining ninja will be. This is also born out in other parts of CoH, when you have to fight your way to the AV through minions, lieutenants, and bosses to challenge the much stronger leader. I would like to suggest a slight change to Supremacy. One that will smooth out MM gameplay in general without adding extra power to them, overall. A passive power which provides 60% additional damage, and a 30% endurance discount. Yet for every minion, 10% damage and 5% of the discount is removed. This can help smooth out standard MM gameplay when a few of their minions die, allowing them to do a bit more damage. It also supports the conservation of ninja principle, and has a third benefit: It improves some less than optimal builds in a marginal way, increasing the number of ways you can play a mastermind. The "Boy and Big Robot" build would enjoy the boy gaining a 50% damage buff and a 25% end discount. The "Top 3 Minions" build would enjoy a 30% damage buff and a 15% end discount. The "Minionless Mastermind" would get to swing a whip that still does fairly bad damage at +60%, and costs less. It also tracks with their end cost increases for their support powers (Infrigidate costs everyone 10.4 end, but Masterminds 13, for example.) The extra 30% end costs exists to offset the additional 6 attackers the MM can bring, but if they don't have the 6 minions it's a burden on top of their precarious situation! However, this change does not A) Increase the ability of a Mastermind beyond it's current levels. You're always better with your pets, you're just less trash without them. And since it's a damage bonus applied to your character it counts toward the cap. A Whipstermind on a team with Fulcrum Shift doesn't deal any more damage than they currently do, which remains very low. Slightly less expensive, though. And a full clear of 8 Masterminds on the ITF will deal precisely 0 points more damage than they currently do. B) Make lower minion builds optimal. Even with a +60% damage bonus on your 3 core attacks and the entire Fighting Pool your base damage is still 0.55. So you're at a massive disadvantage without your minions, even before considering your force-multiplication abilities in your secondary that aren't having full effect without your minions to take advantage. It does make lower-count MMs slightly more attractive in team situations due to the issues of NPC AI and character count on the screen, just for reduced confusion. Conservation of Ninja. It's a solid quality of life improvement for MMs (particularly in the summoning phase when you start out with a 30% end discount) that essentially self-balances their damage and force-multiplication against the number of minions they have active!

We have Robot Arm 1, which replaces your upper right arm with a robot bit and allows you to change your gloves and chest independent of the upper arm. We have Robot Arm 2, which replaces both of your upper arms, and allows you to change your gloves and chest independent of the upper arm area. We have Robot Arm 3, which replaces your right arm, entirely, including some unique full-arm options, and allows you to change your left glove and chest independent of the right arm. So how about Robot Arm 4... Which makes both arms fully replaced? Mostly I just wanna make a character who gets the Cybertech Arm options on both sides, but I bet there's a few people who'd -love- to have the Fire and Ice options on both sides, too!

So hey! Peacebringers suck. Really badly. At every role. There's no reason to take a PB on a 4 star unless they're doing the animation-canceling damage dump that you already intend to fix. Without even that function, PBs will be essentially a carry in 4-stars since they're not as damaging as even a Dominator, marginally more durable than a Scrapper, and have very little in the way of support or control to offset their greater weaknesses. Yes, they can form-change into a Squid to do good ranged damage, but 4 attacks in exchange for suppressing all toggles and being unable to use pool powers or anything is a wild exchange. So my suggestions are as follows: 1) Give 'em .95 in humanform for both ranged and melee damage. So they're still stronger in their forms, but with less versatility, and the humanform is at least useful. 2) Give them a 500% damage cap like damage dealing archetypes. This gives them a higher ceiling to make them more attractive to Kinetics-centric teams. 3) Give them Brute HP values. Bigger than a Scrapper, less than a Tanker, to reflect their reliance on Damage Resistance. And the big one, probably the most controversial: 4) Kill Cosmic Balance as a single inherent and give them three toggled inherents with a 0 end/sec cost. The choices are Offensive, Defensive, and Balanced. Offensive toggle provides procs in the same way Shinobi does "Critical Hits". Defensive adds Punchvoke to attacks and a regen bonus. Balance is basically Cosmic Balance. The goal, there, is to essentially allow you to pick what Archetype you're calling on from the various previously-bonded characters. Even in the different forms. And then, since you plan to do the same kind of mechanics-fix with Warshades... Buff them up this same way. Only make their offensive toggle Scourge instead of Crits and their Defensive toggle provide straight healing per attack instead of regen to play up the "Lifesteal" identity. The end result? 1) Humanform PBs aren't as bad at survival as before, though a Brute is still going to be more survivable and deal more damage when capped (.95x500 is 475, .75x700 is 525) 2) PBs in general will have a better functionality as off-Tanks, but still lake the Aggro-Aura of even a Scrapper. 3) Being in humanform won't be as much of a DPS detriment, though a Blaster, Brute, Scrapper, Sentinel, or Stalker will still do more damage. 4) In Squidform they'll be able to "out-damage" Blasters while capped, but only have 4 attacks, and not be as able to cycle or specialize in ST vs AoE. Especially since Bright Nova Bolt does tiny piddly damage. These changes are also a ton easier to implement than the "Use all Powers in All Forms" suggestions, since they focus on changing up the AT's scalars rather than digging through spaghetti code.

Yes. That's rather the point. That portion of the community would haaaate this powerset and think it's the worst and the rest of us would go have a ton of fun flinging enemies around like ragdolls!

I call it "Chessmaster Control" Power 1: ST Knockback. Power 2: ST Knock Toward. Power 3: Ground Target AoE Knock Left. (If left isn't an option, knockback) Power 4: Power Build Up. Increased Knockback and adds big damage to these knock powers. Power 5: Targeted AoE Knock Right. (If right isn't an option, pulsing knockdown) Power 6: PBAoE Knock to Caster. Power 7: Cone Knockback with massive magnitude. Power 8: Ground Target AoE Pulsing Knock Up and Center. (Animation, flipping the chessboard) Power 9: Pet: Holographic Queen. Do the "Low Rez" body model and then slap one of the crowns onto it. All of it's attacks (Whirling Sword, Headsplitter, Slice, Disembowel) do big knock. Some is back, some is up, some is in. All the powers make black and white squares appear near the target, and then you get a 'gold' line to show where the bishop is moving, or a straight line for a rook, or the L of a knight, etc etc etc. The Tier 2 Knock Toward can be en passant! (This is actually a semi-serious suggestion. It would be interesting to play, but probably a nightmare to balance.)

So... out of curiosity, I zoomed WAY IN on the Crey Biotech image. I recognized Amanda Vines, Dean MacArthur, Jessica Flores, and a few others at the press event... Where is that from, and what's it meant to represent?

Eh. Not my monkeys, not my zoo. If the dev team want people to go to other zones to experience the game world, and they all go to precisely one zone, and that's acceptable, surely allowing them to go to various other zones to experience the game world shouldn't really be a problem. It's up to them to continue their argument that AP should not be the zone people level in, not me. The issue, there, is that people level using papers and radios. Which is why they stay in the zone you're in. A level 15 character getting sent to Talos Island is going to be bouncing to the hospital, repeatedly, while trying to get to their mish.

Okay... So leave Atlas and Mercy out. Problem solved!

With the AE you stand inside a single building entering and exiting a column of light. At least with papers you'd be running around the zone fighting crime!

People go to Peregrine for three reasons: 1) If you're level 40+ your options for running Radio missions (which are what is constantly advertised in LFG) your options are very limited. 2) Most players are Blueside. 3) Shadow Shard is difficult to maneuver around. The density of the mission doors doesn't need to be optimal with these key factors in play. Sure, Dark Astoria could be the preferred zone for radio missions, especially with the incarnate reward options, but then you have to explain how to get to Dark Astoria to newbs. Thanks to the Tunnel portal, Peregrine doesn't really have that problem. Level 1 character needs to get carried? Hit the portal to Peregrine and you're golden. Meanwihle Cimerora requires jumping through a few gates to go in. With this change, we'd probably see a -lot- more hero teams running around Atlas Park (highest filler population)... But is that -really- a problem when most hero teams run exclusively in Peregrine Island, already? In that regard it's just shifting where the Radio Teams spamming for players hang out to wherever it's easier to be. But for people who enjoy specific zones, or want to do a ton of content hanging out in Praetoria post-20, or make their supergroup a "Zone Hero Team" that mostly targets crime in a single place for RP purposes? It's a major boon. Plus people could do radio mishies cross-factionally in Kallisti Wharf, maybe, which could be fun and might result in it becoming a bit of a hub-zone just for a new place to spam radios! So on one hand we've got a boon for RPers and for Variety for anyone who wants it, and on the other hand we've got people making Atlas Park the heart of the game instead of Peregrine Island. That doesn't seem like a heavier thumb on a "Downside", to me.

Blueside they let you do stuff in any zone. Redside, every level 41+ tip mish is in Grandeville, sad to say!

I've also been informed that Message Man and Clockwork A87952 are the Praetorian repeatable mission contacts. Which is great! Now just expand their level range from 1-50...

I mean... the title's it. Let my level 50 character do radio mishies in Cap Au Diable and Brickstown. Add a "Holochannel" for Praetorian Zones to do radio mishies there, too. Still the same old madlibs content generation, just anywhere in the world. Even Hazard and PvP Zones because who the heck cares if someone wants to run around Recluse's Victory fighting pockets of Council or Circle of Thorns bases on instanced maps?

Ahhhhh... that explains it. Thank you! ❤️

I've clicked on a bunch of doors in Cap Au and gotten 0 monsters... Is it limited to specific zones?