Steampunkette

Okay... so... different suggestion: Give each of the different Mercenaries a new "Unlockable" power like they get from the usual upgrade powers. Tie it to Serum. Then make Serum a toggle on your target. 0 end cost toggle. You put it on the Commando and he gains damage resistance and all, but also unlocks an additional power. Maybe a "Bolstering Cry" where your Commando buffs your other pets at random intervals. But only your pets. Give the medic a big AoE heal he'll throw off once in a while on pets and players. Have the Spec Ops apply an immediate 100% aggro-shed and gain an aggro multiplier of 0. Let the basic Mercs get a huge recharge rate buff that they can apply as an AoE to pets and players. It being made a toggle means that it's 100% uptime for -one- of your pets, and it becomes a tactical question of which buff you want. Do you need more AoE heals? Would increasing your team's attack speed be useful? What about making your spec ops into stealth units so they don't get killed? Or are you solo and need to put it on the commando to increase every pet's relative power while making the commando really hard to kill?

So... two big things: 1) Art reflects or critiques our world. There is no alternative. Even landscape paintings portray reality as what the artist saw of it, or wished to see of it, which is why something like Starry Night is so different from most of what Bob Ross put out while still being the same basic thing: A landscape painting. Even the works of Jackson Pollock are meant to press the viewer to apply meaning to the paint splatters on the canvas... but art is also more than paintings. Music, movies, video games, any form of storytelling comes with assumptions of shared values, like 1984 assuming the reader likes freedom and doesn't like the idea of Big Brother being a thing. You get the idea. 2) No one is immune to cultural and societal influences. That which we see in art has an impact. Even, if not -especially-, mass produced media which constantly reinforces concepts through widespread repetition. A lot of the recent Incel attitudes are based on guys expecting love to work like it does in the movies they watched in the 80s and 90s. You hang out with the girl you like and perform big grand romantic gestures and then she's in love with you and chooses you over the other, presumably more handsome, guy she's been dating 'cause your love is "Real" and women in those movies have minimal personal autonomy. Through art we've conditioned people to see this as the way things happen. The way it works. Once those ideas and mindsets are stuffed together in an echo chamber long enough you get the "Nice Guy" and eventually the Incel. Hey, remember Elliot Rodger? Yeah. This is how he wound up where he was that lead him to going out and shooting women 'cause even the ones he never approached didn't fling themselves at him for sexual favors. This arc reflects a particularly painful part of reality. That women are -vastly- more likely to be murdered by a man who they're either in a relationship with, or who -wants- to be in a relationship with them. 4 out of 5 domestic homicides are perpetrated by a man on a woman. And that's including LGBT relationships where the people involved are both male, both female, maybe neither, and women killin their husband/boyfriend/ex/whatever. ALL of those fall into that last 20%. Stating that "It wouldn't be a problem if the genders were reversed" is a false equivalence. It ignores the greater realities involved in favor of pretending there is no difference. And yeah. A lot of male characters die to further the story of other male characters. No doubt! But. Big but. Particularly in superhero comics female characters make up the bulk of romantic interests, rather than the bulk of superheroes, and have for a -very- long time. And they tend to get fridged for a male character's emotional growth (I like to call it manpain!) at a much higher rate than male characters get killed off for manpain. Heck, Gail Simone (Comic Writer) created the Fridge List in the first place. And yeah, there's a few dudes here and there, but most fridgings by a factor of seven to ten are female characters getting killed off. There's been a lot of bad faith arguing, here. As a woman (A trans woman in particular) I feel like the arc definitely has a place in the game. It touches on an ugly part of our reality, definitely, but it is part of our reality. Rather than seeing it removed, or even the ending changed, I'd rather see trigger warnings given to it and perhaps a few of the other questionable arcs that exist in the game. Simple statements letting players know that this concent is pretty damned sensitive and rough. Westin Phipps, in particular, could use such trigger warnings. Could add it to the contact dialogue. Or maybe a popup warning. Not sure. But yeah... I think that would preserve what exists in the game while also making it more comfortable for people who wouldn't want to be exposed to that kind of stuff. Also I loved Captain Marvel. Best MCU film since Black Panther. The reason a lot of people think it is bad is 'cause it's written from the perspective of a woman overcoming emotional abuse through superheroics and such while emotional abuse is largely background noise in most people's lives. It's a women's power fantasy to overcome trauma instead of the traditional "Woman cries a lot and overcomes emotional abuse by finding a good man while spending time with friends and family who love her" Also, of course, the hate that was lobbed at it before anyone saw any of it. So drastic that Rotten Tomatoes had to change their system from all the sexists trying to bury the movie. >.> No one is immune to propaganda!

How much of this EAT was completed..? I know we have the powers lists for it, including what enhancements would be applicable to each power. But were the mechanics put into place? A lot of the animations could be taken from other powersets and, honestly, it looks like Savage Melee and Beast Summoning were made from powers taken from the archetype, so some of their animations and such could be used in both places... The two Shapeshift Powers are probably the biggest and baddest obstacle for this archetype. Outside of asking a modeling team to pop into 3dMax to create compatible models for replacement (Male, Female, and Huge for both Werewolf and Werepanther) it'd be pretty close to impossible.

My advice would be to use it so long as it fits your character's theme. But I would like to also suggest you look at Energy Armor if you're looking to do a Psychic. Nearly bottomless endurance, situational toggles, some defense and some damage resistance, it's an armor set that works really well with the Sentinel's Defensive Opportunity, since it doesn't have a whole bunch of regen or self-healing on it's own. It would have a Psychic hole, though. You could offset it a bit with IO slotting, but don't expect to cap it. But with the right power customizations it becomes a soft pink-purple glow on your character and a duodimensional set of concentric broken rings that really help to sell the "Psychic" aspect.

"It is said that some people are born to be heroes. Others become heroes by the decisions they make in the long years of their life, or only minutes before their end. For me it is more... complicated." -Khamsen Identity: Khamsen (Coptic for Sandstorm) Name: Tasherit El-Masry Height: 6'2" Weight: 180lbs Hair: Black Eyes: Brown Skin Tone: Black Ethnicity: Egyptian Born: 1988 Deceased: 2012 Khamsen was a moderately well known superhero in the early 2000s. One of only a small number of Pyraterrakineticists, she had the ability to impart directed motion and random motion to silicon particles at the same time, vibrating sand to high temperatures as it launched toward those she sought to fight. She took the name of Sandstorm as a result, but due to registration issues, translated it into Coptic Egyptian. Born in Cairo in 1982 to wealthy parents, she immigrated to England by the age of 5 and grew up in the London school system. Her powers manifested during secondary school (8th year) she managed to keep it relatively secret, sharing the information only with her parents and a single close friend whom she eventually began dating. In 2002 she moved to Paragon Rhode Island to begin her superheroic career. While she would never attain the level of superstardom that she had some hopes of reaching, her impact was widespread in the community, focusing primarily on fighting against those who sought to abuse innocents, such as Crey and the Family. During the Second Rikti war, she gained some notoriety among the Heroes Upon the Hill of Talos Island by being so dedicated to protecting her allies that she spent months recovering in a hospital bed after saving a fallen ally by shielding him with her body. During the Praetorian Incursion of 2012 she became trapped in a Brickstown office building while attempting to lead a group of civilians to safety away from an incursion site. In the end she made the ultimate sacrifice to save those innocent lives, collapsing a portion of the building on herself and the rampaging ghouls who were coming to consume her charges. Her body was recovered and her identity revealed in a touching farewell to what many remembered to be the kindest heroine they'd ever met. Her body was enshrined in Paragon at her parent's wishes, in a tomb that bore her costumed likeness on the door. One of many in the graveyards of Paragon City. Seven years later, the tomb was found opened. The body missing. Now a new hero calls herself Khamsen.... or is it the same person, after all this time?

Illusion would be terrible for Dominators. Dominators rely on Hard Controls to shut the enemy down and stop it from attacking so they can wade into melee range and beat all of their foes with brutal efficiency. Superior Invisibility and Group Invisibility don't impact that at all. In fact they're ways of avoiding combat, rather than engaging in it. Spectral Wounds? Dominators already have ranged attacks. And then you get to the pets which are largely aggro-control for a form of soft-control, forcing the enemy to waste time pounding on decoys that you can still pull aggro off of in some cases. There's also the Domination effect being useless for several powers (And only marginally useful for Phantom Army) Honestly? I'd rather see Masterminds get Illusion Control as a primary than Dominators.

Gonna touch on a few of the arguments here, lightly, but there's one that deserves some specific attention: Dominators aren't particularly fragile. And giving them Melee Attacks doesn't make them more fragile. Broadly speaking, every fight has two time values that determine the winner. TTK and TTD. Time to Kill and Time to Death. You die you lose, you kill you win. Suuuper simple. Every Combat power in the game either increases the TTD clock (Heals, Defenses, Buffs to Healing and Defenses, Debuffs to Accuracy and Damage) or reduces the TTK clock (Damage, Defense Debuffs). Some of them do it quickly, some of them do it slowly, but by and large it's all about those two clocks. Control increases the TTD clock just like heals and defenses do by reducing the amount of incoming damage. Whether it's an immobilize keeping the enemy from using it's melee attacks alongside it's ranged attacks or a hold stopping the enemy from attacking at all. The exception is Confuse, which affects both TTD and TTK. Dominators use a powerful "Active Defense" system to lock down enemies and pause their damage output completely through stuns, sleeps, holds, knockdowns, fears... Rushing into melee as a Dominator isn't particularly dangerous because everyone who could hit you in melee (or most of them) can't. 'Cause they're mezzed. Throwing Assault on this AT just gives them the option of remaining close for buff leashing while also picking off flyers or runners or whatever else. It might make them a hint safer now and then (When they're using Ranged Attacks exclusively) but that's the player not realizing they want to play a corruptor. As to the "What about the Epic Pool Hole Filling?" question... Eh? You could hand an Assault/Efflux character pretty much any epic pool and it would round out their build by giving them some control or AoE damage (Which is part of what Dominators get since Assault focuses on ST mostly). Also: Dominators shouldn't weave in and out of melee. They should stand, firmly, in melee, completely untouchable by the petrified statues of their enemies, and tear them apart while their victims watch in mute horror, unable to even look away.

Not every superhero fits into the nice clean ATs the game provides. As to why ATs were implemented in the first place... meh? The game has changed so much since then that Dominator can have permadom and great defenses and Tankers can wipe out a whole enemy spawn with a giant fireball with more damage than a Blaster's Tier 9. We also created a Ranged/Defense AT that essentially functions like a tough to kill Corruptor who forgot to take any of his support powers. I earnestly don't want "Freeform" character design. What I would like is new ways to play this old game we all love. All the "Main Roles" for team-based MMO combat are covered twice over at this point by "Secondary Roles" that can step over any gap they might have keeping them away. The only new ways we can approach the game are to expand the powersets that exist (Adding more, which requires shitloads of art and time) or mix and match powerset types on new ATs like the powersets are Legos and we're pulling apart the house to build a spaceship. Does it mean we're ignoring the "MMORPG Team Design" dynamic? Sure. But who cares? Once you get above 5 people on a team it doesn't matter what the new people are so long as they add more damage/heals/controls/whatever unless there's something your specifically lacking. Take a team of 7 characters of randomly selected ATs and it doesn't matter what the 8th one who joins is 9 times out of 10.

Could we swap the Primary powerset from Melee to Assault? More character variety that way instead of yet another Melee AT. Brute, scrapper, stalker, tank Blaster, defender, corruptor Dominator Needs Moar assault!

So @Chaos Ex Machina sent me some tells in game with a pretty solid idea! What if we use SupR as an in-character conceit and specifically do so through an in-game Global Chat Channel for IC RP Recruitment? We could still use some shorthand stuff, or describe emojis being attached to messages to show off character personality, maybe even have players describe short videos of their characters posting alerts and the like... We could also set up Virtueverse "Profile Pages" for SupR and the like, so people can browse through people's SupR profiles. Would this be something the community enjoys?

The issue comes in Magnitudes and Durations. Control is a primary powers because if you took the mags or durations down it would be largely ineffective. And if you didn't, you'd have an AT with full blasts and full controls.

I've visited a few times, now, during off peak hours. It's great for a semiprivate dining experience with friends or a potential date!

... holy frack that's great!

I added a correction and some corrections to that thread, actually! And yeah. Thank you! Sorry for the inane thread!

So hey. Whips are cool. But petless Masterminds are almost always weak as a blown kiss. Is there any way to make a decent Whips-Only Mastermind? I figure Hasten would be 100% required... but have no idea what else the character would need to be more than useless.

Powers the set would "Need": SelfBuff (Typically Aim or something similar, doesn't require much animation design) A new heavier attack (Something like Disembowel) A capstone attack (Like Headsplitter) PBAoE attack (Whirling Sword, though the current cone could be repurposed into a PBAoE and a new cone created) A "Quasi-Unique" power (Like Chain Induction, Parry, or Boggle) Thanks to the animation for Abyssal Empowerment (A lash around the target's neck and fire running along the whip within a certain range) we have the animations for 5 powers (Aim doesn't require anything new after all!). We could have the neck grab be the heavier attack, capstone, or quasi-unique. Perhaps it could set the target on fire for a pulsing DoT to the enemy and nearby enemies? Not certain. But what could we do for the other powers? Make it explicitly magical (Like Demon Summoning appears) with Runes used to ensnare enemies or get launched as blasts? If so, we've got animations for those as well. How about forgoing the PBAoE and having the whip-set created a Targeted AoE at short range by doing a basic whip-strike attack (Lash) and creating a rune-patch explosion like you're summoning a demon but the demon doesn't come: The ground just breaks? Could alternatively make that the capstone. Use the Water Blast "Jump into the air charging fist" animation and go into a ground-strike where the eart splits open Demon-Summoning style...

It is entirely a roleplaying conceit and not an -actual- App or anything. Wouldn't that be a kick in the pants, though? The idea of a Profile is just as RPed out as getting a notification, not a real thing you get handed. But you know... I could set up an "Everlasting SupR" wiki for people to Virtueverse their characters on it? Then it would have kind of a "Real Connections" feel to it, a little. I'll look at doing that when I get home and over the next few days. I so love the idea of swiping left on "Healers", too! XD As for a "Behind the Times" character, a friend could set it up for them and then it's just "Click the flashing things" or "Swipe left for no, right for yes" and go from there!

One of the roleplaying conceits that my husband and I often use for our characters and among our friends is the idea that there are Superhero-Specific team-up apps. Specifically: SupR. We came up with the concept a few months before City of Heroes went dark, and carried it forward into Champions Online (The only game which came close to the CoH experience, and even then not particularly well). Essentially it functions like a Dating App but for Superheroes. You make a profile, input some information about your powers and relative level of power (Things like Cosmic Heroes and Street Level Vigilantes and such). And you can post alerts for specific threats that get sent to other heroes (or villains!) in your range to ask for their help with notifications and pop-ups. And because it looks like a superheroic dating or hook-up app you can always claim that "Something just came up!" when your cell phone pings. Also, obviously, because people are people, it's sometimes used as a dating/hookup app for superheroes and their groupies. At least narratively speaking. But it's still a great basis for "Random Team Up" RP to happen outside of the old "PPD Told Me to Come Here" canard. I'd love to see this conceit spread on Everlasting, so I am sharing it with all of you!

I picked /elec for theme 'cause I'm a dork. Gonna go with Mu Mastery, too, just for MORE ELECTRIC. Also so my attacks also drain endurance.

Shield is a perfectly good set. And it is super easy to softcap it and enjoy the mini-nuke of shield charge. And when shit goes down, One with the Shield is of course wonderful. But it's nothing spectacular. It doesn't excel in any given way over other sets for Brutes. It's really more about theme and style than the min-maxing power available to it, which is what most build discussions on the boards come down to. That said, while Brutes don't benefit from Against All Odds as thoroughly as Scrappers do, it is still a really nice power. It can bring your output up a bit early in a fight and make your Fury somewhat more impressive when you bounce from fight to fight chasing the fury meter. And Shield Charge makes that distance shorter! I love Street Justice and Shields, myself. Particularly how mean some of the attacks can look when combined with a shield. Heavy Blow's left-elbow strike instead smashes someone with the edge of the shield, for example.

So I'm looking at doing a sapper built Dominator. I obviously intend to use the hell out of Conductive Aura to reduce the endurance cost and make it more accurate. Most of the powers in the set reduce the endurance of targets hit by 10%, which means by the time I've fired 5-8 shots at a target they're probably going to be out of endurance and feeding me just a tiny bit. Do you wondrous people think it is a reasonable decision to focus entirely on the AoE controls and slot for endurance modification, skipping out on the Single Target, since stacking controls isn't the goal, and making my attacks all about the damage? I'm on a tablet as I ask this, otherwise I'd pump out a build with SO slotting (Gonna DFB up a bit, but don't have the inf for IOs) for suggestions and number crunching. >.>

Thank you! Your mind is closed. Thank you for making that clear. Ahhh, yes. By declaring that I am closed minded in response to your disrespectful discourse you reject my position without having to discuss or refute the particulars of it while presenting yourself as the egalitarian party who has tried to present reason and been met with stonewalling foolishness. It's remarkably common for women to be shut down like that. Presented as unreasonable or illogical. Didn't expect it to be my second post on the forum that caught -that- particular reaction. Not liking people using Sarcasm to talk down to you in an example of classic infantilization is close mindedness, you heard it here, first, folks!

so basically you're going to be useless forever, got it i'll stick to my VEAT which already does everything this proposal does but better That's a pretty radical interpretation of the text, Solvernia. To not be the best at something does not mean useless. The intent of the archetype is to be flexible, to cover a lot of roles while also allowing for a wide variety of concepts. Wanna be Batman? This would be how to Batman closer than the game otherwise allows. Martial Assault/Gadgetry Command. Maybe pick up the Leadership toggles. Martial Arts, Stun Grenades, Shuriken you can RP are Batarangs, and Super Reflexes to avoid getting hurt. Swap roles to fit different positions on the team and use your leadership buffs at defender levels. Or create your own character concept that's built around being flexible but not built around GUN and CLAWS and SPIDER FASCISTS.

Blazing Command: Fire Shield Fire Cages Healing Flames (PBAoE Heal in Support) Char Plasma Shield Flashfire Hot Feet Cinders Rise of the Phoenix (PBAoE Group Rez, Usable while Down) Earthen Command Rock Armor Stone Cages Fossilize Brimstone Armor Stalagmites Crystal Armor Salt Crystals Minerals Earthquake Energy Command Lift Kinetic Shield Gravity Distortion Power Shield Dimensional Shift Entropic Aura Gravity Distortion Field Energy Drain (PBAoE Endurance Recovery Buff in Support) Overload Frigid Command Ice Slick Frozen Armor Shiver Arctic Air Wet Ice Chilling Embrace Glacial Armor Flash Freeze Glacier Gadgetry Command Focused Fighting Caltrops Wide Area Web Grenade Focused Senses Taser Evasion Stun Grenade Quickness Elude Mental Command Mesmerize Mind Over Body Confuse Indomitable Will High Pain Tolerance Mass Hypnosis Heightened Senses Terrify Strength of Will Natural Command Roots Inexhaustible Hardened Carapace Spore Burst Evolving Armor Ablative Carapace Vines DNA Siphon Seeds of Confusion Shadow Command Dark Embrace Living Shadows Murky Cloud Fearsome Stare Cloak of Darkness Dark Regeneration Heart of Darkness Soul Transfer (PBAoE Group Rez, Usable while Down) Shadowfield Shocking Command Charged Armor Chain Fences Conductive Shield Jolting Chain Tesla Cage Grounded Static Field Power Sink Paralyzing Blast

Instigator: While most superbeing's powers place them within a strong, centralized, role within a superteam, not all are so lucky as to have their powers flow toward a single position, and must instead find their role in a given situation, in a given team, to make it their own. Some choose this flexibility, and find themselves prepared for a variety of situations. These beings, broadly called Instigators, are flexible by nature. They have to be. Primary Powerset: Assault. By using Assault as a primary powerset we place Instigators in a moving position. Some of their abilities require melee, others can be used at range. Some of the Assault sets also lend themselves more heavily toward Melee, Range, or AoE, with some even offering sniper shots. Secondary Powerset: Command. Command Powersets would need to be cobbled together, but could largely be described as a combination of Defensive and Control Powers. 2-3 defensive toggles, perhaps a passive defensive power or two, and the rest control. This places the Instigator in a position between passive and active defenses. Using controls they can lock down some enemies while using their toggles to help reduce damage from those they cannot stop. Inherent Power: Stalwart, Striker, Support Three mutually exclusive toggle powers which cost no endurance and each causing different changes to the character's abilities and attributes, similar to the Dual Pistols ammo toggles. While the Stalwart toggle is active, the Instigator's Command powers have greater effects. It increases the magnitude of control powers by 1, uses a higher defensive value from the toggle powers than normal, and gains increased aggro generation. For example Focused Fighting might provide +10% defense to melee would instead provide +15% while Stalwart is active. While the Striker toggle is active, the Instigator's Assault powers have greater effects. Specifically, the damage of their attacks will have a second value 20% higher than the base value of the attack which is only used while Striker is active. While the Support toggle is active, each of the Instigator's toggled powers is partially shared with allies within a short range of themselves. This is done through an aura function that only activates while Support is in use. Further, their attacks have a chance to proc a small targeted AoE healing effect around their enemy. Proposed NEW Powersets: Blazing Command (Fire Armor/Fire Control) Earthen Command (Stone Armor/Earth Control) Energy Command (Energy Armor/Gravity Control) Frigid Command (Ice Armor/Ice Control) Gadgetry Command (Super Reflexes/Gadget Control Powers)* Mental Command (Willpower/Mind Control) Natural Command (Bio Armor/Plant Control) Shadow Command (Dark Armor/Darkness Control) Shocking Command (Electric Armor/Electric Control) *Gadget Control Powers would be things like Caltrops, Smoke Grenades, Web Grenades, and Tasers. Powers taken from other sources to be combined with Super Reflexes into a Command Powerset. I'll make a second post in this thread to outline the individual powers I recommend. Archetype Scaling: Damage: 0.85 Melee, 0.85 Ranged Hit Points: 1.25 Support: 1.0 Control: 1.0 So what we have is a character who deals roughly Tanker level damage with a Scrapper's hit points and defense values slightly lower than a scrapper (10% compared to 13% for example). They have good control duration but don't have comprehensive control effects or high magnitudes, and while they're very supportive they lack any powers whatsoever which provide heals, buffs, or debuffs. They're very close to Peacebringers or Warshades in values, actually. Once they flick on the Stalwart Toggle, though, their defensive powers increase to be closer to Tanker, somewhere between Scrapper and Tanker. And while that's not enough to make them equivalent to either, their control effects also increase in magnitude, giving them the ability to lock down foes more effectively and often. Once they flick on the Striker Toggle, though, their damage values for melee and ranged attacks leap up to very near Dominator levels (0.85 x 1.2 = 1.02) which are a bit below Blaster levels. But since both values are the same, they're more effective than a Dominator when fighting enemies at range. Once they flick on the Support Toggle they can provide aid to melee or ranged characters by choosing where to fight. If they hang back and focus on ranged attacks and controls, they're able to provide defensive buffs to the Defenders/Sentinels/Blasters/Controllers/Etc while throwing some small amount of healing to the melee characters. Or they can be in the melee stack providing PBAoE buffs and some small healing as a melee-support character. This is a character archetype that can be played Sentinel-esque by throwing on the Striker toggle and never turning it off. It can be played as a mid-ranged off-tank (Or Tanker, with the right buffs!). It can be played as a more damage-oriented Controller with the Stalwart Toggle. Or it can be played as a new melee-support and ranged-support class. All depending on which powers are chosen, what they choose to slot for, and how they use their inherent power. One Archetype. Three Toggles. Multiple Roles. Evolving as the situation changes, responding to each circumstance, and finding a niche in every team they join because their powers are varied enough to work with different concepts. Hanging with a Mastermind and a Dominator? Pop on the Support Toggle to buff the minions as you bash heads in melee and fling extra layers of Mez onto the battlefield. Scrapper and Stalker? Flip on Striker and help them slaughter everything before it can take a swing. Brute just went down and the Tanker is 60 yards back resting during an ITF? Flip into Stalwart and gather up some aggro while locking down a lieutenant that might screw up your Corrupter. You'll never be as good at a given role as someone of the appropriate archetype, because you'll lack comprehensive power options. You'll never be a Controller or Dominator 'cause you just don't have enough holds to lock down the group. You won't have Aim or Build Up to spike like a Blaster and your ranged attack options are limited. You may get a few defensive powers but you'll never be as unkillable as a Tanker or Brute. And even when you slip into Support Mode you won't have the Buff/Debuff/Heals of a devoted Defender or Corruptor. But you can bridge some gaps your group might have. Or double up on some coverage while still finding your specific niche.