Williwaw

But raising Tanker's HP caps doesn't solve the problem of a Tank being less effective than a Brute. Considering that Tankers already have almost 400 more base HP than Brutes (1875 vs. 1500) and over 300 more Max HP than Brutes (3534 vs. 3212), how is another 200 or 300 HP going to make so much of a difference that they'll suddenly become wanted? Or are you proposing something absurd, like Tankers getting 5000 base HP and 10000 max HP? That still wouldn't fix the issue. A well-built Brute is already just as nigh-unkillable as a well-built Tanker. They're both effectively taking 0 damage most of the time anyway, so more HP is not going to be the gamechanger you claim it would be.

Tankers already have the highest base HP and the highest HP caps. How will raising those numbers further alleviate any of the issues being discussed?

That's the difference between Procs and Globals. Procs only have a chance to activate when the power it's slotted into is used (like Panacea's Chance for +HP/+End or Stupify's Chance for KB) - note that the chance can be 100% (like Regenerative Tissue's Regeneration or Numina's Regen/Recovery) - while Globals work all the time, even when you don't use the power (like LotG's 7.5% Recharge, Unbreakable Guard's +7.5% Max HP, or, confusingly, Preventive Medicine's Absorb Proc*). * The Absorb Proc is really a Global Proc - it only has a chance to activate (like a proc), but that chance is not checked only when you use the power, it's checked all the time. I often slot it in Resurrect powers and it still works.

Controller is an interesting class to me in that it improves almost entirely "horizontally" rather than "vertically". By that I mean that most classes have one powerset where higher-tier powers are generally just more raw damage (most Melee, Blast, Assault, and even MM Pet sets), but Controller Primaries and Secondaries instead both just give more options without generally increasing the damage those options deal (in fact, higher-tier controls usually do less damage). By the time you hit 50, you'll be capable of lockdowns and knockdowns, but with a few exceptions (e.g., Gravity Control's Lift and Propel, Mind Control's Levitate, Dark Control's Umbra Beast pet - not a full list) you still won't be hitting all that hard. My Ice/Time's hardest-hitting attack (aside from Judgement) is from the Sorcery Pool - 90 damage, fully-slotted.

Set Bonuses are always in effect whether you have the toggle on or not. (Globals also don't require the power to be active - so you will also get the Knockback protection regardless of whether you have the power turned on or not) ... note, however, that the two-slot set bonus and the three-slot are not cumulative with each other. They enhance different values (2-slot is 1.25% Ranged Defense and 0.625% Energy/Negative Defense, 3-slot is 1.875% AoE Defense and 0.938% Fire/Cold Defense).

I have a thought, but it may not be useful in helping you choose: I tend to take Patron Pools rather than Ancillary Pools because I like the pets (even my heroes - I switch sides long enough to run the Patron-unlocking arc), but which Pool depends more on character theme or power visuals than on min-maxing. I gave my Grav/Elec Dom Mu Mastery, my Earth/Ice Dom Leviathan Mastery, my Earth/Stone Dom Primal Forces Mastery (entirely for Energy Transfer), and my Mind/Psi Dom Soul Mastery (and then I respecced her to Mu Mastery, too, just because I like the electric visuals better)

Attacks are tagged as only one of the three, even if they'd seem to fall into more than one category, and that category isn't always obvious. Even knowing what Enhancement Sets a power takes doesn't help, you have to look at the power directly. (And even that doesn't help if it's Location-targeted) Foot Stomp is a PBAoE, and it's tagged as AoE and Smashing, despite being used in Melee ranged. Cross Punch is likewise a PBAoE attack (based on the Enhancement Sets it takes), but it's tagged as Melee and Smashing. Serpent's Reach takes Ranged Damage sets while Spinning Strike takes Targeted AoE sets, but both are tagged Melee and Smashing. Fistful of Arrows and Empty Clips are both ranged cone attacks that take Targeted AoE sets, but Fistful of Arrows is tagged Ranged and Lethal, while Empty Clips is AoE and Lethal. Damage auras are usually AoE (Mud Pots is AoE and Fire, Lightning Field is AoE and Energy, Death Shroud is AoE and Negative Energy) except when they're not (Genetic Contamination is tagged only Melee) ... basically what I'm saying here is that, yes, you need AoE defense, too.

Light-on-dark was fine on the old forums, but for some reason, not on this one.

... I think I mainly just want a black-text-on-a-white-background skin. Something about the combination of this color and style hurts my eyes in a way the old forums never did. (Also, the whole site now feels very sluggish)

Yeah, but worse... I tried to do it as two separate quotes instead of one long quote, and it wouldn't let me. No matter how I formatted it, it made the second one a quote-within-a-quote instead of ending the first one and starting the second one. Anyway, the original plan for Omega sounded really really overpowered, even more so because that wasn't supposed to be the end, and they were already planning a second tree of ten even more powerful slots above it. (I'm still sorry the game went down in 2012, don't get me wrong, but sometimes I think that if it hadn't gone down, the game would be completely unrecognizable by now)

There's a lot of powers in the game that don't accept the proper sets, particularly pet powers. Homecoming fixed a lot of them (e.g., you couldn't slot Defense Sets on the Protector Bot on Live even though it takes Defense enhancements), but they apparently missed a few, like the Umbra Beast. Report it as a bug (and bear in mind that the dev team is rather busy right now, what with all the Sniper changes and other things oooh mysterious, so they might not get to it for a while).

The Lore AMAs had statement from the devs on how Genesis and Omega were going to work:

I had a Stone/Stone Tanker back on live, and ... I got him to 50, but I didn't enjoy it much. Usually I just left the basic toggles running (S/L Defense covers a lot of attacks, really), and only turned on others if the enemies I was currently fighting required it (particularly Endurance-drainers), and rarely used Granite at all (because I hated all the penalties). Conceptually, I love it, but it was a set made for a very different game than the one we have now (or even the one we had at shutdown).

That was a change made for I24, not Homecoming. Before the I24 Beta, no set gave resistance at all, but in I24 they turned the various specific Mez Resist set bonuses (which were never very popular or useful) into general Mez Resist and damage resistance. Before the game closed, my Elec/Invuln Brute had 10% higher resists on the beta than he had on the main servers due to those new set bonuses, despite having the same sets.

Okay, so I actually made a character along these lines. Shield/SS Tanker, with the only attack from the secondary being Jab. It's not bad, but it's not very good. (It got better once I got and six-slotted Shield Charge and six-slotted Cross Punch with Obliteration, but it's still not great) That said, Weave and Combat Jumping stack with the SD toggles beautifully, but the whole thing is just an End hog and actually beating enemies is slow-going, even moreso than usual for a Tanker. Maybe if I'd taken a Brute or Scrapper instead it would feel stronger (but Tanker just fit the concept otherwise). Edit a couple of days later: After getting them to the mid-40s, and adding Foot Stomp and KO Blow to the mix, they feel better (in fact, the character is starting to feel downright awesome, especially for a Tanker), but most of their damage isn't coming from the Fighting Pool powers, though Cross Punch is still pretty good.

No, it won't, because that's not the white space I'm talking about. The white space I'm talking about is caused by the sidebar for each post being so huge that even on a one line post it takes up... well, this much space: Two one-line posts, and it takes up my entire screen. THAT'S the sort of white space I mean. The icons need to be made smaller, and the side pane more compact in general.

Right, because, as I said, it only works on Friendlies. It doesn't grant enemies Endurance, it just does nothing to enemies.

Ah, thank you. One other thing, though... is there a way to see which topics I've posted in when looking at the New Content link? The old forums marked the topics I'd posted in with a smiley face, and I don't see any difference in icons here. Edit: And also: This. The font size is tiny, the icons are huge (which stretches the size of posts even when there's barely anything written in the post), and there's a lot of blank space around. ... sorry, I hope I'm not being pedantic, but the forums are ever-so-slightly harder to read and harder to use in a few different ways.

I always started in Galaxy City.

That's not really the same thing, though. If you disable Hide Place Enhancement Prompt, it'll nudge you before every single enhancement you place, even in empty slots. There's no prompt that only goes off if you attempt to replace one Enhancement with another.

Oh, I found something I definitely don't like: ... can you not edit after a certain period of time? I can't edit the post I made a half-hour ago. Anyway, in regard to one of the comments in that post - the "Game Account" link at the top of the forum works, but the "Game Account Creation & Manag..." link does not lead anywhere. ... and, yeah, my icon was definitely not made to be viewed at this size. I'll have to find a new one.

The "new content" page is buggy (it shows new posts, but it links to the first post instead of the new one - edit: nope, that was me clicking on the wrong thing; found the right link now), and the Account Management page seems to be gone. I'm not sue I like the format, either. HUGE icons, tiny text, a lot of empty space. Gonna go mess with settings to see if I can fix any of that. (And, of course, all my bookmarks are now invalid. I had the New Posts page bookmarked instead of the front page) I mean, I'll get used to it, I'm sure, but overall it's not much of an actual improvement on this end.

There's also a list on Paragon Wiki, but it's out of date, and doesn't include the second Archetype set, the Winter IOs, Overwhelming Force's KB->KD / Chance for Knockdown, and, of course, the new KB set added for I25 whose name escapes me at the moment. The list also includes Globals (bonuses that are always on, regardless of whether you're using the power they're in) in addition to Procs (bonuses that have a chance to activate only when the associated power is used). But it's still reasonably complete: https://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Set_Enhancements_with_Special_Effects

That's exactly the case. Performance Shifter affects the target, not the user, and doesn't work at all if the target is not an ally. If you want it to proc on you, you have to put it into a power that targets you... yeah, like Stamina. The Call of the Sandman proc works differently, and always affects the user regardless of the target of the attack. Thats why you saw that go off but not PF's +Endurance.

Just one additional comment... The Performance Shifter: Chance for +End proc is not a Unique, so you can put one in Stamina and Superior Conditioning or Physical Perfection (or all three).