Falcon Striker

haha yeah, my bad

Maybe if they change how rage works a bit? Just tossing ideas out there. Give them a toggle, let them store rage longer and it drains less quickly, then when they turn the toggle on, their attacks start consuming the rage meter like a resource that gives them more damage output. You could also make it to where building meter improves their defensive passives and toggles, the more the better. But if they choose to consume that meter for dps, they take more damage as their rage goes down from consuming it? That way you can keep their dps in check, and they can adjust how they're playing based on what's required of them. Need to tank? Just do less damage and keep your rage up. Want to dps? Consume stored rage. That way they're never just out of control in both regards at the same time, or they can try playing a balancing act with enough skill.

I'm seeing a lot of mixed opinions after your post so it's going to influence my response a bit. I guess sentinels bring mediocre dps to the table so it begs the question, does their inherent ability bring enough to the table? It seems good to me but I haven't got one to 50 yet. Seems we also both agree Brutes could use a bit of love. I guess my friends have been dooming and glooming a lot lot about the balance. Maybe his brute DOES get better after 20. I myself played a DM/SR brute with super speed and I've been enjoying it so far, we both got to 13. I believe his is super strength/invulnerability and he claims it feels worse than playing a scrapper at that level. He claims he can't hold threat, he dies too easily. I was healing him during this with empathy as a defender. Just not sure what to say to him. He said he tested things out solo too after we did Posi1 and his health would drop by half being hit by 1 yellow enemy. Even my SR scrapper wouldn't get hit that hard. But it seems regardless, at least some level of scope creep is real. Does their inherent ability make up for their lack of damage compared to other AT? Fair enough man, but that kind of proves my point more, actually. I can pick a scrapper, not do the golden ratio like I was supposed to, and still get to 50 smiling ear to ear and only seeking help to min max at the end game. I took the advice btw, 3dmg/2acc/1end red works wonders, I'm slowly replacing them with attunement enhancements. That being said, couldn't you take that knowledge so much further with better classes? It kind of ignores what the thread is about, scope creep. Like okay, sure, you could make a brute viable, I believe that now after reading the comments. But.... why would I pick a brute over a tank? Or a scrapper? I feel like I'm knee capping my potential, and for what? You could argue play style, I guess? But so far I'm not seeing anyone even attempt to deny brutes could use a bit of reworking/buffs. Among other classes that just fall behind performance wise. I personally used DM/SR and got to 13 like my friend and felt it was fine, I still feel tanks do their job better, and I don't think anyone will argue with me about that. My friend was griping about his build, which I believe was super strength/invulnerability and he said it felt bad in every regard. Holding threat, damage output, and especially just not dying. He was testing it solo too. I wasn't sure what to say to him. But I did some digging in older threads, seems gripes about brutes are a common sentiment and they've got hit over the years with a lot of nerfs. Maybe I'm just naive but Tanker>Scrapper>Stalker> then waaaaaay down the list would be Brute, but I guess I have to put them in 4th if we're just going off of melee AT's. But to me they seem like they're in a similar spot to sentinels, a weird hybrid class that's mediocre at everything, but at least the sentinel provides a rather potent debuff that's always useful, and they don't have to do much to use it, a brute has to work hard for their meter and they lose it so fast. I agree, you can't perfectly balance a game like this, or any mmorpg, that's just not a possible thing to achieve, I get that. I'm just not sure what to say to my friend who's having a rough time with his brute. He went Super strength and invulnerability and it seems a lot of people agree brutes do suffer a lot from scope creep. I think they can be viable at least, but don't you think it kind of sucks for people who don't know better? They don't know how to min max or get the most out of a build. The common theme with replies I see is that you need to know how to build a brute, and how to slot them, and with a lot of other AT's you just don't have that issue. You can be a scrapper and kind of suck and still have a good time. Or a blaster. You're not going to be brutally punished for lack of game knowledge for picking them or how you build them, at least not as bad when compared to a brute and THAT's the issue I have. Players who don't know better pick the class after trying others and they like the class but realize "wow this feels awful compared to a tanker, why am I wasting my time when there's better options?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I guess in general guys, you make good points. But it seems we also all agree scope creep happens with the classes. Sure you can technically make all classes "viable" Sure a bad scrapper is worse than a good brute, makes sense. But at the end of the day, you can take that same game knowledge to a good class, and be even better, some of the classes could use some love. It's kind of a hard sell on a new player who didn't know they picked an inferior class, to tell them well you shouldn't have picked those powers, and end game you'll need these attuned merit reward enhancements and you need these procs for your build, THEN you can tank efficiently. Of course you'll need to farm merits or earn about 10 mil per enhancement for the AH, so about 40-60mil per power or proc mule. Meanwhile they're trying to do Posi1 and struggle bussing, lol.

I just want to start an open discussion about the game balance, and end game viability and things like scope creep. It's something my friends and I are starting to notice trying the archetypes out playing a lot recently after not playing for a long time I'd like to first bring up what brought up this discussion, Brutes. I guess they got nerfed a lot, and SURE you could maybe argue they can fill a dps slot and be some what viable with procs. But then I'd argue scope creep. Why pick a brute over a tanker or a scrapper or even a stalker? They just seem inferior and their rage meter doesn't help them much at all. I've also had some people tell me Sentinels are weak, it's why they get unique defensive abilities like enduring in SR. It also has me thinking about power sets. Again, you can make arguments about viability but it's hard to just ignore scope creep unless you're willing to ignore it for the sake of theming your character. That being said, not all power sets are created equal, and a lot of these issues seem to have been going on for years. It kind of feels bad feeling this all creep up, loving the game for the freedom in builds it offers, to slowly come to the realization that some options are just, really bad or subpar, and wondering what choices are traps you'll waste your time leveling? You tell yourself "Well maybe when I get to level 20 it won't suck." Then you tell yourself it gets better at 30, then 40, and you realize you wasted your time and have to go back to the drawing board. Not even trying to find a super meta build, just be at least viable, do what the class/power says it does as advertised. I should pick a brute for example (I know I'm harping on brutes a lot), and not have it feel flimsier than a scrapper while also doing less damage, and I can't even hold aggro. But when I play a scrapper or a tank I feel powerful. If someone asked me, "what's the worst class in the game?" It shouldn't be an easy answer, but it is (the answer is brute btw and a lot of people would agree I suspect). EDIT: INB4 skill issue comments or pointing out my lack of evidence. "I can play brutes good". Cool, good for you, I'd still argue scope creep.

I'll give that a try

Okay so what do they forego, then? Accuracy? DPS?

None, do people even do that? Seems sub optimal to do anything to your primary attacks other than accuracy and damage. Maybe I could test it out and see if having huge dip in my DPS is worth it? But even then I don't see why you'd ever want to sacrifice more than 1 slot you'd otherwise dedicate to damage or accuracy. ESPECIALLY considering merit reward enhancements and other end game enhancements, not to mention missing out on set bonuses. It makes more sense to me any way, to put endurance reduction costs on toggles, which I do, all my defensive toggles are 3 defense and 3 end red, on top of all the effort I put into end recovery passives and min maxing those as well. I tried plugging it into MIDS, I guess I could sacrifice 1 accuracy enhancement, this is the result I got in the image below. What ratio would you use? 1 seems to reduce the cost by 42.4% according to mids. Maybe it's worth it, but it does come at the cost of about 30% of my bonus accuracy I was having before. So say I miss, it costs me more energy to attempt the attack twice, than it does to do it once successfully at base cost. Or maybe make sentinels not suck? Also if we're talking about variety, I don't see how we're achieving that if 1 archetype gets unique options, and others archetypes with the same power do not. If that's the goal, wouldn't it actually more sense to make each archetype with the same power have unique options for every class? Not like every option, but like 1 or 2 that set their version of a power apart from other archetypes. There's already examples of this, why not do it more across the board? Just sounds to me Sentinels need a buff, they felt fine to me I'm using a dual pistol SR sentinel. I still need to get one to max level, though. I get what you're saying, though. I'm just not so sure it's accomplishing what you're saying without also giving other classes unique flare to shared powers, so I'm meeting you half way. I agree but also disagree so I altered my approach. Fair enough

That makes sense, but the game's been back since 2019, so the only reason I can think of them not updating SR for other archetypes is MAYBE balance. I'm still jealous of enduring, though, I min max inherent Fitness and Energy mastery to make up for it, and I STILL blow through all my energy fast if I'm not careful. What I would give to have access to that power. I MOSTLY want Enduring, I will forgoe the other stuff sentinels get for it. Like I said above, I try to minmax physical perfection and Inherent Fitness, but I find I have to manage my energy far more with my scrapper than ANY other class. And it's probably like that by design, but I'd at least like to know is it like that by design, or an oversight? I mostly am after enduring, I get not granting the other things, just give me that tasty tasty enduring. Okay I suppose that makes sense, but I'd also argue they've changed a lot since their original design already, and their passives were designed around that original design intent. I think at the very least you could give other SR users enduring at the very least, I can see leaving the other new stuff out of their reach. But I just want to be able to keep up with my team without having to pace myself between attacks by 2-3 seconds each attack, or relegating myself to just using my first two abilities as a martial arts/SR scrapper. Either way, love the combo, but I'd feel like a kid on Christmas morning if I could get enduring. (refer to above replies how I min max every energy recovery power I have access to attempt to circumvent my weakness of having stamina the likes of a mono sufferer)

I was wondering why sentinels only get access to master brawler and enduring for SR, but the other archetypes that have access to SR don't have those? Can we maybe get those for the other SR archetypes in the future? Especially enduring, it would be a major game changer with my Martial arts/SR scrapper build