Brutal Justice

The casual player does not hit 45% defense with a blaster, or possibly any archetype. Chances are they don’t even know about the soft cap. It’s not as though they would have an actual -5 defense. Also shield has more than just positional defense as it’s layers of survival. So that’s simply not true. Same with with super reflexes. They both contain resists. Shield has hp and a very strong aoe attack. They both have a form of +dam on as recharge one as straight +damage.

@El D @Neiska @Bill Z Bubba Have you all forgotten just how capable you are in this game without 54% defense? Down to 40 or 45% doesn’t make or break your toon. Have you forgotten how powerful a team of 8 randoms can be in this game with zero IOs? 40% defense merely slows down a blaster. It doesn’t make them unplayable by any means. That’s the difference. It slows people down in teams as well. You get to use your ice slick as a controller and “feel” like you helped. Your flash arrow “feels” helpful. You might actually find a use for placate. You think it pigeonholes team comps when it doesn’t. It simply makes the casual player, who is the majority, feel useful. It barely slows down a power gamer. Thats the point of 40%. Just to slow them down not neuter them. You all react as though your toons would become impotent. It’s simply not the case and would offer a smidgen to the casuals.

In solo play even tanks and brutes would see a hit to performance once the difficulty was cranked up. Running at max difficulty would become much harder. Especially your @Werner rules player debuffed etc ITF runs. Would it still be possible? Probably. Would it take a longer amount of time? Absolutely. Very few builds could even accomplish it. Max difficulty is not achievable by all toons currently or with the proposed hard cap. There is nothing wrong with that. Solo play would see the brunt of the nerf. Having a tanker in a team at 45% wouldn’t be THAT much more useful than having a tanker currently is. You’re right the lower defense numbers wouldn’t matter all that much with a tank drawing aggro. However, a blaster with 40% defense could still wipe out a spawn solo. Thats sort of my point though with 40% defense. It’s not a huge nerf. It merely creates openings. It creates small amounts of value for toons that currently have very little without upsetting the whole dynamic of not requiring the holy trinity.

Hmm. Not sure they are that helpful in solo play though... that’s one of those team play talents.

I am glad you can solo. I am not trying to take soloing away from you. Do you think solo players can sustain an online game? How many people do you think call out LFG and log out of the game shortly after if they don’t find a team? How many people are asking for teams and TFs in the, wait for it, LFG channel? It’s also not about making tanks and brutes MVP. If you notice, I also placed a meaningful defense hard cap on them as well. It’s about ALL archetypes. 40% defense is a lot of defense. You can solo with an SO build. 40% defense is still a monster in relation to that SO build and you’re claiming you wouldn’t be able to solo with it? 40% doesn’t all of the sudden make IOs not worth it anymore. If you hit 40, you probably hit it before you would have hit 45. If my math is right. So now you can pick up more recharge, or more hp, or more resists. There is still a place for a soloist. If you absolutely can not play solo without soft cap, then play a tactical arrow blaster. 1 flash arrow. You’re at softcap again. Play dark melee. Soft cap again. Plant manipulation. Willpower! So many options to “artificially” achieve your softcap goals. I dont even Gronk your statement about some toons solo better than others... I’ve made no comment to the contrary I am glad you like to solo. You could still solo at a very high level. Therefore, it’s not a very strong case against a 40% hard cap.

-ToHit is a great example of how many different archetypes and power sets would suddenly find much more value than they currently have. Both on teams and solo. In incarnate content and normal content!

It would indeed give -ToHit some value! Dark blast would rise from the ashes as THE blaster primary!

Please explain. Don’t just dismiss. How is a rewarding team experience horrible for an mmo?

Dropping the defense of archetypes would not make tanks and brutes required. In light of your play “stuff other than council radios” response. I would respond. People who give this sort of response don’t play the game outside of max performance builds. You don’t need a tank or brute on your team now. From level 1 to 50. Dropping people to 40% defense is a far cry from making somebody “required”. I also consider it a lazy response

This is an mmo, an mmo that encourages teaming. I want to feel useful on teams. I want teamwork on teams. I feel teams are the lifeblood of this game. The community is the lifeblood of this game. If people are made to feel superfluous in team settings, then in my eyes, that is unhealthy for the game. Unfortunately this is the current feeling of the game, which has caused my personal playtime of the game to crater. The most beloved game I have ever played, for so many years and countless hours. What is the root of so many people asking about game balance? Answer. IOs What is it that people achieve with IOs that makes people question balance? What is it that people chase the most with IOs? Answer. Defense soft caps. If non “tank” archetypes were hard capped at 40% defense it would solve almost all issues usually brought up. It would have little to no effect on the leveling experience or speed, except by those elite few who softcap immediately upon zoning into Atlas. It would have zero effect on SO builds. It would have zero effect on moderate IO builds from beginners just experimenting and getting into IOs. It would have zero effect on people’s concerns of money money money. You would not all of the sudden feel like you live in Jack’s 3 minion world. It would really only affect probably half the people on this forum in any sort of negative manner. It would greatly help the teaming experience, which I mentioned earlier as very important in my eyes. It would not require great amounts of dev work and game restructuring. “Squishy” toons would still be very durable. It’s a nerf with very few negative effects and many positive ones. People don’t like nerfs. Sometimes nerfs are necessary for the health of a game. You can solo in this game, but it’s not a solo game. Do they make online solo play games? What is the average life span of a player in a solo game? A common complaint about Champions Online, which so many of us probably tried out after the snap? No reason to team. Bring back the value of teaming! Not just reward chasing! Hard cap tanks and brutes at 45% defense. HEATs and VEATs at 43%. Everybody else at 40%. PS. I know the incarnate soft cap is higher.

I don’t remember a shortage of blasters in the olden days. Blasters today are also much more powerful than they were then. With crashless nukes and amazing sustain.

Very clever, but could that possibly be the 1% that I left room for when I said 99%...

I didn’t say they were as durable. What I said was a soft capped blaster makes your “max survival tank with 3 attacks” largely pointless in 99% of the game. “A Scrapper stands gloriously among a swarm of charging enemies. A Blaster stands gloriously over a pile of fresh bodies.” @Shred Monkey Just substitute tank in there for scrapper if you wish. Hard capping the non-tank types at 40% would give value to much more than just tanks

There is no reason they should other than you want it. They didn’t have it for how many years and did just fine? Possibly brutes and khelds because they somewhat fill tanker roles. Not scrappers or stalkers. They are plenty durable with 40% defense. It’s the same exact logic as them having lower res caps.

Remove base buffs and pay to win buffs. Then hard cap non tanker archetypes at 40% defense. Balanced. You can still min max with IOs and be crazy strong. You just can’t tank everything with your blaster and make half the archetypes pointless. Let’s be honest, all the other archetypes pointless.

Frozen aura is not generating assassins focus for ice melee stalkers. I tested with my ice/fire stalker and never saw it proc in my combat logs.

I just tested with my ice/fire stalker and never once saw a stack of assassins focus proc in my combat log when using frozen aura.

Is frozen aura not granting assassin’s focus? I am pretty sure I have never seen a stack come from this. If so, is it a known bug?

In the old arc you could run around the entire city with the Vahz wasting disease. In the current arc you have to quarantine or risk losing your hero status and possibly the mission? I don’t know about that, I’ve only ran it once and went “hero” so as to not affect my teammates. Old arcs are not judged by today’s events. It can be fun to look at them and see foreshadowing and Orwellian prophecy. However, it is another thing for an arc to be written in ways that reflects current events. Mostly I don’t want to be reminded of current political events while playing a game and the dialogue of this arc unfortunately did.

I feel like it’s a middle road performer. The biggest issues I have with it are: 1. It shares the same animations with mace and broadsword 2. Considering 1. Mace just does more damage, combine that with how smashing seems to be better than lethal at the late game. 3. Broadsword tanks get to take hack and skip the lame power while battle axe is stuck with Beheader 4. Broadsword also has parry. But really if it had unique animations I would roll one right now. Unfortunately I already have a lvl 50 broadsword tank and a lvl 50 mace Bane so I don’t want to play another toon with the exact same animations again.

This is why I want energy transfer to have a full crit and blast 20% of my health! I don’t want a dumb sustain heal! I want to hit a guy so hard I almost kill myself!

Is it weird to quote yourself? I just wanted to say I am not bitter about the changes because it sounds like they have helped quite a bit and I’m glad the devs have been working hard on it. Ok... maybe a little bitter about the crits.

Yes that is exactly what I want to do. People currently have to make the choice with a garbage power. There is no reason this would require a re-eval of PC and ET.

I wanted no mechanics. Old energy transfer. Barrage turned into Hack numbers. Full crits with double self damage on energy transfer crit. Didn’t get even one of those things...

Bone smasher is usually taken but I see everybody complaining they skip using it to avoid using their EF. Everybody has to take either barrage or energy punch. I think the mechanic should be added barrage to provide the build choice and give a little to tanks stuck with barrage. Especially after energy punch was buffed. There is zero reason to give it to both barrage and energy punch. Giving it to one does not require giving it to the other as well. There would still be three choices of spenders. Forcing an “extra” layer is not really forcing since all but tanks have the choice. Also, if it frees people up to use bone smasher when they want, it feels better. Nothing is more useless than a power in your tray you avoid using. It’s especially egregious when that power is an otherwise good power.