Sovera

Reinstating the less problematic animations into the menu as official emotes would be lovely. And I say this as someone who doesn't even use any of them or has.

They are talking relative speeds, Infinitum. Don't nitpick when it was re-explained a post later. I GET what Qi is trying to say. I'm saying I too have a long experience with the game and it's not -that- common we are more than 30 seconds away from an objective (which we now reach sooner than before since we fly faster than before). 20 seconds is acceptable to me when this happens.

If you don't want to test and don't care about the numbers others have posted then I must bow out of this conversation. I don't know how often you are not within 30 seconds of a mission which, btw, is something testing would have told us.

Did you test this? Actually test this? People have tested and posted above. You can continue giving your opinion on your feelings or you can test and come back and say they were finks who distorted the truth to suit their bias. -I- did not go and test. I'm basing myself on what people have posted here. 20 seconds slower on a distance long enough for Afterburner to not cover it. 'Unacceptably slow' is not how 20 seconds looks like. But this is subjective. To me it just is not. I am not, repeat, not being flippant. I honestly want you to come with numbers that prove your point and counter what others have said.

It's been a long time so don't quote me, but I vaguely recall rumblings about their buffs not being needed. On soft squishy targets like council run at +1 I can imagine this was so. I made a friend recently who only plays healers and had rolled their empath and was ready to engage the game in the traditional manner. I gently coaxed them towards Kinetics instead pointing out that they would get to heal as they wanted to do, but that later on when heals aren't as needed they would still buff the team and make everyone happy by their presence. As far as I can tell they are still perfectly happy when I ask them. They heal when needed just the way they wanted to but they notice how their buffing accelerates things to the point they mentioned how they barely have time to attack themselves. I tell them that's a sign you're doing a great job. The reason I don't like murder balls (and tend to solo/duo things) is how often we are scrambling trying to find a target as things die around us. If I see a boss at half HP and most of the screen clear I know the team is converging like a frenzy of sharks. What is even the point in joining up and trying to squeeze in a hit? So I leapfrog ahead once the pack of mobs is half dead.

In my own experience (but please take this with a grain of salt since what I am about to say is subjective and not math) heals and shields don't help (much) against DDR. Strider above mentions how 'so many heals won't be overkill' and that's one thing I've experienced myself: when the DDR nation attacks heals don't do enough. Or much. Speaking strictly as as Tanker I can quote my usual ITF experience: I jump in, I start killing things fast as Fire Armor does. But, if for whatever reason, I take too long, or get some unlucky misses, or don't have BU up, or a second group joins, then I will go from being at most-of-my-defense and 100% HP to -30% -40% defense and my HP plummeting in seconds. At this point two things can happen: 1) - I have already killed most things. My health is in the yellow, my defense is in the reds, my heal is recharging, but there are only three or four mobs left. I let my natural regen take the wheel and continue pounding the last of the enemies. With so few I'm safe as they don't hit fast enough for the debuffs not to expire and my heal recharges fast anyway. 2) - I have -not- killed most things. Perhaps I jumped in without BU to help me kill fast or another group joined in, or enough lucky hits went through right at the start and debuffed me hard. Regardless of the why I'm surrounded by enemies, my HP is in the yellow, my defense is in the red. In this scenario more heals or a shield don't help. In the time it takes to animate the heal while debuffed into the reds and surrounded by enough enemies still hitting and keep the debuffs up I will have that recovered HP dropped before the animation has ended. In the second scenario it does not mean I'm going to dead (it would if stubbornly girdling my loins and refusing to budge). I immediately take up into the air out of reach, wait for my heal, maybe use Barrier to recover my defense or just wait until the debuffs ended. More heals would serve me no purpose since jumping back in the second scenario (too many enemies still alive, defense in the red) would just have my HP smeared again until the debuffs expired. A shield is just a preventive heal, but when we are taking 95% of the hits it gets eaten. Now, this is an extreme case. As I said in the past I tank the ITF just fine. I just plunge first when it's the towers and that means I'm at agro cap for a good while until the towers are cleaned. But I'm also in a team that is helping with the killing so mobs are crumpling. When I mention this it's just to say that X armor set is better than Y powerset can boil down a lot to spreadsheets but when we are actually playing the game everything works out fine to 97% of the game.

It's peculiar that the winging way of making up things as we go (Marvel/DC comics, that at some point become so rife with contradictions (oh hey, lets make the Flash say he can react to things in a femtosecond -and- can break the light barrier. Now lets have him get surprise punched by someone who throws boomerangs) that they are forced into period reboots) is actually being sighed at with nostalgia. I much prefer things explained and related to each other even if the in-game explanation is not how the lore says things actually happened. Guild Wars 2 did one thing I rather liked at the time and was that the lore found in the game (usually taken as iron clad gospel by players) was -not- a retcon but rather a mix of racial propaganda and rewriting history. Things -had- happened as lore said they did, but the races rewrote things to their liking either because they were the victors or because enough time had passed to distort things.

You know, I'm rather curious about this. It pretty much shows how we cannot, and should not, try to please everyone. I've had this interaction (once) in the past. We were on a Citadel, team split up, someone mentions the team split up, we pipe in that the team seems to be doing fine (no one was dying). Player was unhappy. We keep on playing. After two or so missions they mention they don't know why they are bothering since everyone is doing fine and can 'solo' the missions by themselves. I don't believe the person quit but they were unhappy. At this point, like with them as with you, I don't know what I am expected to do. The mission -can- be done more quickly with everyone splitting up. No one is dying so it's not hard (Citadel, Council, etc). So we need to go all together in a tight knit group for... what reason? To make someone happy about being in a team ball? I'm not being sarcastic. This is me asking. What is the expected behavior? You're saying if you go into a team and three players can tackle the content and are tackling the content alone instead of a team ball you just quit the team. What is the expected behavior? Even if fighting an easy enemy that is not dangerous it's not being done correctly if not performed in a team ball? Has it become a sin to purchase attuned IOs and actually work out a build instead of randomly slotting things? For some people this seems like a yes, and I return to my first paragraph.

I don't have connection problems. I have a 1gig connection and do not use Wi-Fi. It really is something that only happens when standing in place for a while. And chatting. At the top of my mind I don't remember crashes in my long idling bouts in PD. Someone like @Number Six can probably dissect the latest crash logs.

And instead of 246 you get 387 + double chance of procs going off, yeah. But if wanting to use something else than Fire Armor then Spinning Strike or Sweeping Cross is acceptable.

There are two things to consider here: - First is that comparing the game with mechanical decisions regarding gameplay to the comic book demi god that hears a gunshot from the moon and travels down to earth in time to stop the bullet is always going to end in tears. Compare rather to more normal power levels and it's not unheard of that top speeds can be breached via adrenaline and need but there is a reason why 'top speeds' are called top speeds and not 'unhurriedly moving along'. If a motor only goes up to 100 kph it's not because there is a big need to stop a bullet that it suddenly goes up to 500kph. But there might be a turbo function (dare i say afterburner?) that allows to momentarily redline this. - Second is that I'm hearing a lot about feels and not enough about testing. There were people who actually tested the travel powers and reported their findings: in a complete straight line with absolutely nothing in the way and over a long enough distance that 30 seconds was not enough to reach then Fly reached the door 20 seconds after SS. In places with detours (if I recall correctly they tested in Grandville or something?) and shorter distances Fly outpaced the others. So we need less spreadsheet navel gazing and more 'I went to X map, tested, and Fly is unacceptably slow according to these numbers'. Which, per testing done, is not the case. Most times we are in 30 second distance of a mission, more often there will be detours.

Perhaps not blind but rather your Mids being outdated. Be sure to have the latest one. Could you post a screenshot of what you're seeing? I see what you mean though, but if you reorder slots everything is accounted for though Mids spazzes out even in respec mode about too many slots spent at level 49.

Spinning does less than half the damage of CU. Looking at my current build Spinning does 240 damage with three combo points where CU does 740 with three damage procs (but I prefer slotting a FF proc with 89% chance to go off in order to accelerate cooldowns so 676). You can go around this by switching the order in which you use the skills. AoE just spam Spinning Strike. ST use Spinning -after- CU (ergo before starting to accrue combo points). The 2.5 gap gets filled regardless but now your three combos points are not used.

Awkward. Early Build-Up replacing early AoE is a bit of a wash... -with- Burn to replace that lack of AoE. BU + Burn kills half a pack so BU or Dragon Tail is kinda the same honestly. The single target definitely suffers. I won't wax more poetic on the animations which are extra sweet compared to MA but Shin Breaker -definitely- would have gone to level 26 to spread out the set's hard hitters. Dragon Tail and Spinning Strike are a bit of a wash as well. DT animations a sliver faster, ST hits a bit harder on three combo points. Combo points add a layer of awkwardness when we have our finisher ready to be used but not three combo points (easy to happen since things recharge fast but if we use extra clicks (heal, BU, FE, Consume, even Hasten). I find the combo points don't add enough damage to matter much and tend to just ignore them. If I have the combo points it's cool, if not the skill goes off anyway. Back when I tried it on a Stalker, I think it was, I noticed I would hit a -1 lieutenant with Crushing Upper and no combo points and leave it on a sliver of HP, then I would do the same but on three points and the mob would also be alive on a sliver of HP. After mathing it up looking at the combat log there -was- a damage increase but minimal. On the long term it remains a damage increase though, but I bring this up to say I feel it better not to be a slave of combo points. Better throw out more Spinning Strikes in an AoE situation or more Crushing Impacts than to delay them. Speaking of CU it has some very nice damage proc interactions to it does about 150 damage more (per mids, I need to reach 50 and test this with in-game numbers) than Crippling Axe kick. Without Burn there would be an awkward 2.5-ish second gap that could be filled with Spinning Strike to use up those combo points... but then CU is up and now it has no combo points to use because Spinning Strike's much lower damage consumed them.

Yeah, I read the manga. Definitely StJ for him and his successor. 'Our' super man is more of a brawler when ever a writer forgets he has had extensive martial training. StJ has been nice. It's easy to get an attack rotation going in the early levels And I can say it hits deceptively hard. Spinning Strike has enough radius for me and with three combos is okay in damage. I don't really trust Mids so I will be subjecting the character to comparison tests against MA once it's at 50.

EM definitely has the oomph and Invuln without something to boost damage can make good use of it. The AoE isn't all that bad if you can squeeze Power Crash since it recharges fast enough to allow PC, Whirling, PC. Even for a Tanker and on Invuln it's enough to down the minions and hurt the rest. Rad Melee has horrid animations and way too lenghty ones down the line. But it does have a beefy heal. The heal is not -that- random since you can force it with Fusion. Fusion, <whatever> (forces contamination because of Fusion), Radiation Siphon (eats contamination which triggers the heal), <whatever> (forces contamination again), Radiation Siphon (second heal). You can pretty much start every fight like that and have two heals to counter the alpha without relying on RNG. I'm currently leveling StJ (with Fire Armor, of course) and it's a bit clunky because of the spread. Rib Cracker is beautiful but doesn't hit particularly hard, and then nothing to alleviate this until level 35 and then 38. That's a lot of leveling to be spamming a T1 and T2. Burn carries it but with Invuln you won't have that. Should be fine if you're always teaming up. I've been re-thinking the build to include Sweeping Cross instead of Heavy Blow. It would lose the FF in Heavy Blow for leveling and exemplaring, but SC would give an early AoE and combo spender.

Just for the DDR I'd say Invuln. Well, DDR and the -large- influx of defense when surrounded by enemies which is when we want defense. Who cares if defense goes the soft caps when only 1-4 mobs are left? Once 1-4 mobs are left they simply don't swing fast enough to outpace natural regen. Invuln does it all. Rad is a tough egg easily cracked by defense debuffs since for some weird reason it is allowed for -defense debuffs- to melt -resistance- sets. But Rad can survive thanks to the heals and shields too. But since you've asked something like Invul/Rad Melee. Live off Recovery Serums until your slotting is in place while Rad Melee helps with some healing. I'm not sure if Rad Melee and farting cloud gases fits your idea (it's a pretty damn useful and powerful gas cloud that nearly makes the real reason to take Rad). I'd personally use Claws, but that's zero superman like. You don't necessarily -need- Super-Strength though. Just because it's written on the box it doesn't mean you need to go for it. Even Claws you can choose the smallest weapon model then try some trickery with gloves and try to hide them, though personally I love the vanguard energy weapon skin from claws that sprout from the forearms. But it's not very superman-ish.

Tunnel Witches is good for solo. A single run is enough to reach level 12. I would probably do it until level 22 and then just start on comic con. But think ahead and make a second account and level another farmer at the same time (both in the same team). Then in the future you can use it power level your alts.

Is there a chance the unique IO behavior can return to how it was? Before one of the last patches we could slot something unique like the ATOs or purple sets, then switch to the alternate slotting to hide them and slot the same in another power in order to compare things or what ever reason. Now changing to the alternate slotting is still counting the set as slotted in. I am not allowed to slot it, UNLESS I slot one that is not in use (for example the damage IO of purple sets we seldom pick) and then use the repeat slotting function in middle mouse button

I fear to say this behavior continues. I can get you the crash logs. It -seems- to still be related to chat as the crashes happen in PD after having done a max buffer chat emote, then start to type the follow up and the game crashes.

Recovering from a stint at trying Scrappers again I noticed how well the proc worked in Power Crash. I had this AoE rotation of Power Crash, Whirling Hands, Power Crash and it was -very- satisfying to open with PC, see the message, and then see Whirling Hands come down crashing like a house on the surrounding mobs.

True, without any rewards matching it there would be a lot of difficulty to find teams to run missions with those difficulty settings. On a REGULAR basis. Finding such a team to do it once or twice should be possible. I mean, heck, @Linea runs their uber hard, no-special-rewards-attached-to-it architect missions on a daily basis multiple times. But back to the OP, small teams is what you want. Advertise as such. Heck, play over Everlasting and I'll be there with you.

I solo and duo stuff where I can because full teams just steam roll. But, I'm one of the 'four' mentioned above. So even if you did come and join me you'd feel the same. You'd 'help' by throwing buffs but have a Tanker who shrugs off damage and nearly two shots packs when BU is up. The solution is lifting the difficulty. Form a team and mention you'll be running it at +2 (if during leveling). That said I don't know what to tell you. Since when was CoH actually hard? Before IOs we'd run around in +4x8 teams melting the map. Nothing much has changed.

The effort at making pool powers useless makes so people do not pick them because they are useless. Manpower, code hours, etc, all gone to waste. I can imagine the statistics and devs sipping coffee as they look over them: Dev1: 'Hmm, 20% of the players were using RoP. It dropped to 5%.' Dev2: 'Our job is done.'

This is something I cooked up but never really played. There are sacrifices made (nearly no -recharge protection) in order to push defense and above all energy resistance. I don't necessarily agree with my own choices 😄 Such as having more AoE in the form of Fences and Lightning Ball instead of Focused Accuracy for the -toHit debuff protection and Physical Perfection. But you get the gist of the idea with the 40% defense to melee, ranged, and AoE, as well as capped resistances to everything except toxic and fire/cold with two stacks of the ATO (14%) plus Barrier's 5% resistance and defense (making 45% to defense). You can pick things apart for your own build and see what ideas you wish to keep.