KaizenSoze

I have run this arc on a few ATs, scrapper and standard Night Widows fared the worst at 4x8. Even fully kitted out. I found that I must use all the solo tricks, LOS pulling, jousting, stringing them out and picking off strays. Scrapper don't joust well, it's tedious, but doable. Standing in melee too long or pulling two groups usually ended badly. Night Widows was doable, non Night Tank version, could joust better and pull better with smoke nade, but suffered badly in melee due to lower hit points. Those crits really hurt. Night Tank version was fine, liberal use of smoke nade, and incredible durability allow her to duke it out in melee. Fortunata was fine, because of the good mix of range/melee/control. Still a couple of crits and it got dicey. The most fun was my elec/ice/mace blaster. Slow, end drain, then move into melee to finish. Lots of jousting, LOS pulling, but still it was a fun challenge. TLDR. I loved the challenge, but can really wreck some toons due to high melee damage. I just had to turn it down, at least the team size if not the difficulty for my melee focused toons.

I understand that some folks might want the old behavior back. My first testing was on Dominators and the pet was almost a liability solo against tough groups. Think 4x8 DA or PI mobs. The pet was so stupidly aggressive that I could not safely prep groups. One memorable experience was peeking around a corner to confuse a BP boss and then watching the pet charge into the spawn at full speed. The pet was much more manageable on a controller, at least with dark/storm/trick arrow. Especially, dark and trick arrow. But there still remained the issue of charging into melee and turning its cone powers effectively into single target powers. The new ranged pet is an improvement IMO, but it has trade offs as people have noted. CoH's core pet AI is not good. The devs have made it better over time, but there is only so much they can do.

From what I have tested, it will be easier to herd when groups are close. They won't wander off if they are a patrol for instance. On a full team, it won't matter a lot, plenty of aggro to go around. Small team or solo, it will be noticeable with more incoming fire. Initial pulls of large rooms might be a bit more exciting. No more using the aggro cap to only have to fight 17 at a time when there are three close groups solo.

At this point I would suggest posting videos to show the differences. Not saying you're right or wrong. Just hard to get context of what people consider fast or slow. A Rad tanker does seem like a good idea. The -defense is really needed for the lowbies to hit. Having been a lowbie many times. The constant missing is frustrating.

One toon I have been testing that is working shockingly well is my Ninja/Trick Arrow Mastermind. So much debuff that rarely anyone dies and lowbies appear to be able to hit things. The ninjas do plenty of damage that I don't have to manage too much. If there is any addition support toons in the team, the ninjas never die. I ran a team for more than 45 mins yesterday. I lost 5 pets the whole time.

Several missions in red side's Mr. G arcs.

Page 5, Council is replaced with, The Awaken. Added to the pool, Rularuu and Malta, yes I know they rarely appear.

I am not saying you have to make a toon specifically for PI radios. What toon do you think would work best running a PI radio team?

We have plenty of thread discussing the page 4 changes. I don't want to talk about that here. Assuming page 4 going forward as is. I expect more teams running PI radios for power leveling. What toon would you use to run PI radios? Not just council, but all possible enemy groups in PI radios. Things I am considering when deciding on a toon: Durability to handle most or all of the aggro This could be thru high defense/resists or massive debuffs Enough damage to complete missions in a reasonable time with sub 50s on the team -defense or toHit, so lowbies can hit +5 mobs -resists, so the lowbies can do some damage to +5 mobs Buffs or healing to keep the lowbies alive Things I haven't thought of... What are your favorite toons to run PI radios to help level others?

Yes, those two Carnie attacks are very annoying. I will sometimes have to retreat till they wear off. But they have always been this way, attack type changes didn't alter them. Mark of Vitiation, ranged, negative: https://cod.uberguy.net/html/power.html?power=carnival.carnival_ring_mistress_inherent.mask_of_vitiation Mask of Weakness, ranged, negative: https://cod.uberguy.net/html/power.html?power=carnival.carnival_steel_strongman.mask_of_weakness&at=lt_grunt

I have quibbles around the power selection order and I am not a big fan of Arctic Breath due to it's cast time and cone size. AOE. If you have enough recharge, which you seem to have, I think Venom and Frag grenade are enough AOE for a Bane. Don't forget that Crowd Control is AOE. Alpha. I use Muscularture Radial. Banes don't have the endurance issues that plague Widows. Unless you proc too much, another reason I don't like Arctic Breath, end expensive. Procs. Poisonous Ray procs above average. So, does Surveillance, but I didn't have the slots to do that. ITF Hardmode. Bane's biggest weakness is no DDR (Defense Debuff Resistance). Teleport. Using Fold Space to pack mobs for nades and Crowd Control really helps. Also, makes the team AOEs more effective. I use /bind lshift+s powexec_location back:35 "Combat Teleport" after fold space to get out the ball of mobs I just created. Here is my current build as food for thought:

Read Luminara's post a few up. He details some of the history of defense in the game.

Final note about controller testing. Unless something changes. If you want to solo regular content I would suggest Symphony/Storm. More team orientated or hard mode content I would Symphony/TA. Of course, you can use either for solo or team. Both can solo 4x8. Trick arrow just brings more debuff that stacks nicely with Symphony for very tough mobs.

I haven't seen this in my testing, but I believe you. It's possible you got very lucky with the rolls. The proc rate on Aria is poor, but if you're hitting enough targets you could get a couple of streaks.

Not true, specifically for Banes, because of the switch between two weapons. Gun and mace. I agree single weapon redraw does not hurt DPS.

Completely agree. Night Widows are good, just Fortunatas are awesome!

I do think Fortunatas are superior to Night Widows. One non-obvious thing Night Widows have over Fortunatas, durability, it is easy to make and manage a much more durable build than Fortunatas. Night Widows have easy perma Mind Link and have slow resists. This advantage is only noticeable in extreme content. Diantane, search for, Night Tank, if you're curious. Going to quibble here. Banes are stalker/debuffer with a nice defense aura. They have two powers that inflict -resist. Huntsman are what Sentinel want to be when they grow up. 🙂 Lots of AOE, high defense, and resists. A flying Huntsman is practically un-killable. The price is your single target damage sucks. One weakness that all Bane/Huntsman/Crab share. No Defense Debuff Resistance, zero, zlitch. You will always take the full debuff hit. This is very noticeable on ITFs. Also, there is no way to turn off weapons redraw, which does eat into your DPS if you are switching between gun and mace attacks. Mostly effects Banes, because you want to use Venom and Frag grenades.

Interesting. I was just testing with my controller and I definitely could CC things. I don't have a super strength toon to test with alas.

I might be mis-understanding. Cimerora mobs are notorious CC resistant, even before the changes. The surgeons are a pain for melee characters.

I agree. We had to cheat because we were running at 2x8 with three people. Not because of the attack type or aggro changes.

I love them. They are a challenge to fight. No snark intended, sometimes you have to turn the difficultly down. See 4x8 Carnies for most of my characters.

Yes, I made an SO only, cannot remember the AT at the moment. It was fine as the difficulty I would normal would have played with only SOs.

American Angel has good advice. You can copy your character to the beta server: https://forums.homecomingservers.com/beta/ I would start with things you normally solo at your normal difficultly on live. Then try the same thing on beta.

Yes, some mobs in some groups have been changed to use different attack types. Please, post what entire groups, or even 50% of a group that have been effected by this change. Specifics are the key if you want anything to change.

I have read your post all the way through twice. Please, post specific examples of mobs that are wrecking you now. I have run defenders, corruptors, and controllers through multiple tests against 4x8 groups. I am *not* seeing a massive difference. Yes, everyone will be taking some more damage even if they are not relying on softcapped s/l. This thread is mostly people who have tested and found that the change not huge and people who have been theorizing that it will apocalyptic. If you have found a group that is wrecking you now. Please, please, please, post a description of who you were fighting, what level, and what AT you were using. Posting your build would be helpful. Adjustments have been made, because testing found that Lord Recluse got rather nasty. The toxic/psi defense buffs are a result of people testing specific groups and finding an issues with specific mobs that got a boost. Example, Toxic Tarantulas. If you want the devs to listen, test and post specifics.