Weekly Discussion 48: Dark Armor!

[GM Miss]

Weekly discussion 48 - Week 4/26/20-5/02/20:

⚔️ YOU VOTED: Now that our Archetype discussions are over let's focus on a few power sets you guys voted on that you would like to talk about.  ⚔️

First up is: Dark Armor!

 

❓ Things to think about:

>Here is a link on Dark Armor: https://cityofheroes.fandom.com/wiki/Dark_Armor

>How does it compare to other armors and defensive sets?

>What would you change?

>What do you love?

 

Don't just use these prompts, talk about whatever you want from this weeks prompt!

 

Let's Chat 😄

[Myrmidon]

2 hours ago, GM Miss said:

Weekly discussion 48 - Week 4/26/20-5/02/20:

⚔️ YOU VOTED: Now that our Archetype discussions are over let's focus on a few power sets you guys voted on that you would like to talk about.  ⚔️

First up is: Dark Armor!

 

❓ Things to think about:

>Here is a link on Dark Armor: https://cityofheroes.fandom.com/wiki/Dark_Armor

>How does it compare to other armors and defensive sets?

>What would you change?

>What do you love?

 

Don't just use these prompts, talk about whatever you want from this weeks prompt!

 

Let's Chat 😄

 

The only thing that Dark Armor needs is an endurance reduction. In a “ balanced around SOs” environment, no set should REQUIRE IOs to function.

Edited April 26, 2020 by Myrmidon

[ArchVileTerror]

If not an Endurance Reduction, than the inclusion of an Endurance Management element to one of the Powers.

Yes, thematically Dark Armour is "paired" with Dark Melee, and Dark Melee has Dark Consumption for that . . . but that doesn't do Dark Armour any good when paired with any other Melee (or Blast, hello Sentinels) Set.  Adding an Endurance Management element to all of the other Melee Sets would be ideal, but obviously impractical.  Although Savage Melee's Endurance Discount mechanic is a nice one to consider.

 

So, what if  . . . hmm . . . this is tricky.

Dark Regeneration is really strong already.  I mean, maybe if it granted scaling Endurance the higher your current Hit Points were, so it becomes a choice between saving it for when you need to save your life, or using it to keep fighting.

Oppressive Gloom is really late in the Set, but could have its self-Health drain increased when lower on Endurance, and provide a Recovery boost, maybe?

 

Short of inventing a whole new Power for the Set, what else do folks recommend?

[SwitchFade]

1 hour ago, Myrmidon said:

 

The only thing that Dark Armor needs is an endurance reduction. In a “ balanced around SOs” environment, no set should REQUIRE IOs to function.

Yeah, gonna have to emphasize this.

 

I've looked at all angles of this and DA is just too hungry overall, not even running all the toggles.

[Parabola]

Dark armor is in an odd place because it performs badly without IO's and very well with them. All the gaps in the set are exactly the things that are easiest to build for with IO's: defence, end management and even knockback protection. There is also a siphon end proc that looks like it was designed specifically to be used in dark regeneration.

 

I ran a dark armor character pre issue 9 and had a generally miserable experience. Now I absolutely love the set but only because I can throw IO's at it from low levels. This makes it a tricky set to balance though, it's all very well saying that everything is balanced around SO's but an eye has to be kept on the high end too.

 

Ignoring wider set balance issues there is a power that really needs looking at: cloak of fear. I would be interested to see the figures but if cof isn't the least picked power in the set I'd be astonished. It's end cost is too high and it's accuracy is too low, both by a considerable amount. No amount of slotting can currently turn this into an effective power.

 

Fear is a tricky control anyway, particularly for a set with a damage aura, so even if the acc and end were sensible it would still be debatable whether it would be worth running for the -tohit it provides. Like all debuffs the biggest problem is that this will be resisted heavily by anything you'd really want to effect. Making it unresistable like flash arrow could be an interesting twist?

[Heraclea]

I had a tanker back on Champion - Dark Armor/Ice Melee, that I rather liked.  It was my ambition back on old live to get every single tanker armor to level 50.   (Got everything but Electric.)  This character got a late start, because I wasn't really eager to play the set.  Prodigious endurance costs were the reason.  They still are, which is one reason why I haven't yet made a Dark Armor character on HC.

 

Dark Melee remains one of my favorite attack sets. It oddly has little synergy with Dark Armor; the endurance recovery power has historically been much too slow to help with DA's issues.  The two self-heals that require mobs and a to-hit check don't really complement each other.  The -tohit of DM complements a defense set more than a resist set IMO.  The self-heal of DM benefits sets without a self-heal (Willpower) or a slow self hea; (Invuln) more than Dark Armor itself, which does have another self-heal with a to-hit check. 

 

Like Fire Armor, the last three powers are quite skippable.  Everything in the set that directly helps to keep you alive is available by level 12.  You can skip the weak fear aura, the disorient that hurts, and the self-rex, which I never take on a tanker, and seldom on a brute.  This gives a bit of build freedom, anyway. 

 

 

 

 

[nihilii]

1 hour ago, parabola said:

Fear is a tricky control anyway, particularly for a set with a damage aura, so even if the acc and end were sensible it would still be debatable whether it would be worth running for the -tohit it provides.

Even though the damage aura seemingly works against it, Scrappers can make good use of it in that the fear stops enemies from running, if intermittently, and keep them longer in the damage aura. Of course, it's less valuable on Brutes and Tankers, and that use remains questionable even on Scrappers because of the end cost. But if the end cost was negligible, I'd definitely use it for that purpose.

[Major_Decoy]

I would love to get rid of the screaming skulls in cloak of fear. I'd also say that the endurance cost of Cloak of Fear is quite unseemly given that it has base 50% accuracy.

[Bopper]

I will also suggest what has already been suggested. Reduce endurance consumption, improve Cloak of Fear accuracy. It doesn't have to be base 75%, but 67.5% perhaps? And let's give Dark and Fire Armor some Knockback Protection... at least for Tanks and Brutes.

[Gulbasaur]

4 hours ago, Myrmidon said:

The only thing that Dark Armor needs is an endurance reduction. In a “ balanced around SOs” environment, no set should REQUIRE IOs to function.

Myrmidon speaks the truth. It's a strong set, but good golly it uses a lot of endurance. If you pair it with Dark Melee, you eventually get to recover your endurance, but as a set on its own it is quite rough. 

 

Personally, I love that it has an element of control built in - it doesn't feel like a generic tanking set. With cloak of fear or oppressive gloom running, you have a very respectable amount of crowd control very early in the game, which I think adds significant value as a team member.

 

The lack of knockback protection can be mitigated with things like Hover and I think it is a fair payoff. I don't think it should be part of the set itself - all the sets should have some downside to prevent them from feeling too generic. 

Edited April 26, 2020 by Gulbasaur

[Wild Claw]

My main is a MA/DA brute, not a combo allowed for on live, but here it is.

 

Have to echo the commentary above, without set/proc IO's DA is really tricky to work with and needlessly frustrating. However, set/proc IO's seem to be built very specifically to plug that endurance hole, to the point it feels like overshooting the mark. You go from 'Dear lord, this sucks.' to 'steamroll' without ever hitting the 'I have to pay attention, but I can deal', that other sets seem capable of building with SOs. I have no idea how you fix that without making the IO-ed build even more so.

 

And yeah, Cloak of Fear feels like it's not effective enough for it's cost.

[Parabola]

6 hours ago, nihilii said:

Even though the damage aura seemingly works against it, Scrappers can make good use of it in that the fear stops enemies from running, if intermittently, and keep them longer in the damage aura. Of course, it's less valuable on Brutes and Tankers, and that use remains questionable even on Scrappers because of the end cost. But if the end cost was negligible, I'd definitely use it for that purpose.

Oh I'd love to make proper use of it. It feels like it should be one of the set defining powers. I bet plenty of newcomers to coh pick dark armor on the strength of the description of that power alone. They are likely to be bitterly disappointed by the reality.

 

6 hours ago, Major_Decoy said:

I would love to get rid of the screaming skulls in cloak of fear.

Yeah this too. Once it has been buffed to point where it's useable the graphics could do with an overhaul. I bet it could be made to look awesome now.

 

Actually, on the subject of graphics. Something that I think dark armor in general (and many other sets for that matter) could benefit from is a saturation slider in the customisation options. This can be manipulated to some degree with the colour choice but it would be great to be able to exert a bit more control. With most colour options you are basically a walking cloud after a while, there's usually a great costume buried under there somewhere!

[Coyotedancer]

Dark Armor is a miserable set.

 

Between the ridiculous visual FX and being an utter END-hog,  it pretty quickly became my least favorite choice 'back in the day' and somehow has never managed to get any better. Even with IOs, it still manages to be annoying in small ways. And large ones, if you're not into looking like a dust-bunny caught in an explosion at Hot Topic on Halloween. <_<     

 

 

 

 

Edited April 26, 2020 by Coyotedancer
I spel gud.

[Heraclea]

7 hours ago, Major_Decoy said:

I would love to get rid of the screaming skulls in cloak of fear. I'd also say that the endurance cost of Cloak of Fear is quite unseemly given that it has base 50% accuracy.

Whenever I have made a Dark anything character, I have always taken care to recolor all of the associated funks and fogs hot pink.  It helps. 

Edited April 26, 2020 by Heraclea

[Yomo Kimyata]

My sure to be unpopular thoughts:

 

I think this is a great set as is.  Dark Armor does not need to be improved.
 

The issues with endurance are a weakness of the set that you should plan around, just like momentum in TW and speed in stone armor.  People talk about how sets need to be balanced around SOs and that is silly.  Even the newest noob can see that the SO system is both more complicated and less intuitive than the common IO system.  If endurance is a problem, then add an endurance reduction in your attacks or toggles and take out a damage or resist damage.  This is all a trade off, but the gut instinct shouldn’t be to make every set so that it matches the best part of every other set.

 

Cloak of fear accuracy is fine.  Slot for accuracy if you want it higher.  It’s a trade off v. More terrorize or more to hit rebuff.  From experience anything over 100 accuracy effectively locks down minions indefinitely.  I’d like the skulls aura to be optional though.

 

another reason I like this set is that it has a lot of tools and you don’t have to take all of them to be effective or thematic.
 

please please please don’t boost this set simply because it’s not as easy as some of the other armor sets.  Change the visuals, sure, but please stop the power creep.  I don’t want all sets to end up as TW/bio.

[SwitchFade]

48 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

My sure to be unpopular thoughts:

 

I think this is a great set as is.  Dark Armor does not need to be improved.
 

The issues with endurance are a weakness of the set that you should plan around, just like momentum in TW and speed in stone armor.  People talk about how sets need to be balanced around SOs and that is silly.  Even the newest noob can see that the SO system is both more complicated and less intuitive than the common IO system.  If endurance is a problem, then add an endurance reduction in your attacks or toggles and take out a damage or resist damage.  This is all a trade off, but the gut instinct shouldn’t be to make every set so that it matches the best part of every other set.

 

Cloak of fear accuracy is fine.  Slot for accuracy if you want it higher.  It’s a trade off v. More terrorize or more to hit rebuff.  From experience anything over 100 accuracy effectively locks down minions indefinitely.  I’d like the skulls aura to be optional though.

 

another reason I like this set is that it has a lot of tools and you don’t have to take all of them to be effective or thematic.
 

please please please don’t boost this set simply because it’s not as easy as some of the other armor sets.  Change the visuals, sure, but please stop the power creep.  I don’t want all sets to end up as TW/bio.

What you may be missing is...

 

Not that DA shouldn't have it's unique mechanics and balance considerations, but that those severe drawback should come with significant benefits 

 

As it stands, with SO's, nearly every tank primary is just as strong or STRONGER without the accompanying END issues.

 

Either make it stronger or make it less hungry.

[Hardboiled Hero]

It would be kinda cool, but not necessarily appropriate to all character concepts, if Dark Armor powers actually looked like ethereal armor pieces.

 

  I don't have a lot to say mechincally, I'm only getting back into the game over the past week and even when I played Live I didn't have much end-game experience, as I started playing with the release of CoV and all my friends were quitting around that time because "Brutes are way too powerful.. I mean their tanks can do as much damage as a scrapper!"

 

  My first real character (after having tried the game on a friend's account) was a Super Strength/ Dark Armor Brute, who had been a Supegirl-esque hero, but was killed and was then raised by a powerful Necromancer to serve the cause of death.  Like many of my characters, the concept was better than it actually worked mechanically.  Not only is super strength relatively weak for a Brute, but Dark Armor ends up being one of the weaker Armor sets AND endurance hogs.

 

  Why do I say Dark Armor is one of the weaker armor sets?  First please understand that I'm not saying Dark Armor is bad.. I specifically mean that Dark Armor isn't defensively as good as Willpower, Regen, or Invulnerability..  Dark Armor really seems more like a "middle of the road" set..  Unlike the more defensive sets, Dark Armor has an PBAoE dot which, combined with "middle of the road" defences is likley to get a character killed.  Or at least that was my experience from Live.  Invulnerability and willpower would keep my character alive, Fire would do tons of damage and kill everything that was trying to attack you, and Dark Armor would get you killed.

[Cutter]

I mained a Spines/Dark scrapper back on live from i3 to shutdown, and very recently started a reinvention here as a Dark/Savage tanker. I ran Crimson Shroud through incarnates back then, and pretty much everything the game offered at the time. I'll never claim to be a master of the set, but I'm not entirely talking out of my butt either.

 

The endurance cost thing has been well covered, so let's tackle this from a little different direction. I'd say DA struggles with a bit of an identity issue which is compounded by 1/3 of the set being highly optional. That, and one of the big selling points in the description is entirely untrue.

 

Let's look at the description:

Quote

Dark Armor allows you to tap into the powers of the Netherworld for protection. Many Dark Armor powers drain your foes to strengthen you. Dark Armor offers very good resistance to Negative Energy damage, and is one of the only defensive sets that offer some resistance to Psionic damage. However, its resistance to Energy is weak and it offers no protection to Knockback.

1. Tap into the powers of the Netherworld. OK, sure. I mean, the armour set explicitly states an origin of the powers, which of course can be handwaved. But still for some people, that's going to set up an expectation of everything from name to costume to RP. Strictly from a fluff perspective could that be looked into?
2. Many Dark Armor powers drain your foes to strengthen you. Umm... no? This is where I think the set really falls down. Of the powers that affect foes, Death Shroud is a standard damage aura (drains enemy HP but doesn't strengthen me); Dark Regeneration actually works as advertised; Cloak of Fear, as mentioned, suffers on a number of axes and, again, doesn't actually strengthen me; Oppressive Gloom actively weakens me (at least via damage) to achieve its effect, which is the opposite of how "many" powers are stated to work; and finally Soul Transfer, again, works as advertised but I'd hardly call a self-rez "strengthening".
3. One of the only defensive sets that offer some resistance to Psionic damage. This is no longer true. If you take "resistance" to mean more generically "you have some form of mitigation to" psionic damage, and strictly looking at the Tanker armour sets here, then we have: Bio with a small amount of +res and +def; Electric with a solid +res; Rad with a moderate +res; Stone with a beefy +def; Shield and SR with their positionals (yes I know most psi attacks lack a positional vector, but there are some); and WP with a moderate +res and a reasonable +def. That leaves only 3 of 11 sets which DON'T have any kind of psi protection (5 if you remove SR and Shield from the above). Either way that's more than half the sets offering psi protection. Despite DA's being head and shoulders the highest single value (base 50% on a tanker), it's no longer as unique as it was. I'd also argue that psionic is not the damage type to be most worried about. That distinction seems to be going in the direction of energy, and, well...
4. Its resistance to Energy is weak. Yeah. This right here. Energy damage mobs are encountered far more often than psionic ones. If my armour set is the best against a minor percentage of enemies, but the worst against a major percentage, I'm gonna have a bad time.
5. It offers no protection to Knockback. It's an annoyance, which can be mitigated easily by IOs, or more conventionally by going deep into the Leaping power pool for Acrobatics. Sucks that the latter option kinda pigeonholes us into a travel power, but Stone has it much worse so I can let this slide.

 

So. What do?

 

Personally I think any changes should revolve around making point 2 more correct. If I'm reading my set description and it tells me that a lot of my powers have a -enemy/+me effect, then actually make a lot of my powers do that! These are totally off the cuff and prolly unbalanced suggestions, but I'd tackle the powers that affect foes and:

• Death Shroud - Nothing fancy, just add a -tohit effect here. Negative energy damage tends to have this baked into it, I'd simply port that here.
• Dark Regeneration - Not gonna touch it. I've read a few comments to the effect that DR is the cornerstone of the set (e.g. "if they can't kill you before DR recharges, they can't kill you"), so I don't see a reason to mess with it.
• Cloak of Fear - I'm "wrapped in nightmares" and treating my foes to "visions most horrific". Let's buff CoF by borrowing the stats from Nature Affinity's Entangling Aura (while keeping it a Terrorize). EA has a slightly higher endurance cost, but a much better accuracy, larger radius, and chances to proc magnitude up to affecting bosses. I'd love to see some -def get thrown in there, or an equivalent self +tohit, to reflect that cowering people generally are gonna be easier to thwack (and while we're at it I want a pony). Oh, the existing -tohit doesn't go anywhere.
• Oppressive Gloom - I'd love to see an increased mag on this, or at least a chance for it (similar to the CoF change above). Minions are the least of anyone's worries, and having them disoriented for the 1.3 seconds they're alive is practically worthless. To address the "strengthen you" part of the point, and make this power more of a consideration, I'd also complement the existing -HP with a new +Recovery element.
• Soul Transfer - Suggesting a (relatively) simple change, which is surely not original to my brain: allow it to be used as a +HP/heal/rcv when alive (in the same vein as Second Wind from the Sentinel version of Regen, or on a more thematically appropriate tack, Soul Absorption in Controller Dark Affinity).
• Bonus track! Energy weakness - I'm honestly not sure how to handle this, as I completely agree with the notion that every set should be weak to something. However, with Energy damage being so omnipresent, I'd certainly not turn my nose up at a small buff to base stats just to make this one slightly less impactful over a large amount of content.

 

That went on a lot longer than planned. I love me some Dark Armour but find it does not compete well with a lot of what's out there right now.

Edited April 26, 2020 by Cutter
weird formatting tricks

[siolfir]

Ahhh, where's the lolDA that would've been in the first few posts on the old forums?

 

Biggest complaints for me are the appearance and KB hole (seriously it exists on 2 and a half sets - Fire, Dark, and Stalker-only Ninjitsu; at this point just give it to all of the armor sets and let the squishies use the IOs). I could see removing the accuracy penalty on Cloak of Fear given it's endurance cost, but since I don't plan on ever taking it unless it's buffed having terrible stats just means it's easier to work in the Fighting pool.

 

Yes, it has more toggles than most other sets, but the resistance toggles cost less (0.208 vs 0.26 per sec), Cloak of Darkness is Weave with some stealth for less endurance, and the other toggles are no more expensive than any other damage aura (Cloak of Fear has a high cost per tick, but ticks once every 5 seconds meaning it's 0.52 end per second: the same as Blazing Aura, Lightning Field, and Death Shroud). I suppose you could give Dark Regeneration the DNA Siphon treatment where it also applies a small amount of +end per target, but it really is just a matter of managing toggles - something you have to do even more with Stone Armor, which has as many toggles (7) and only has one that is under .26 end per second. It's just that with Stone Armor you can't run all of them at the same time because Granite is mutually exclusive with 4 of the others (Rock, Brimstone, Crystal, Minerals) - Mud Pots costs more end per second than Cloak of Fear, though.

[Heraclea]

1 hour ago, siolfir said:

Cloak of Darkness is Weave with some stealth for less endurance,

The relative incongruity of putting stealth on a melee armor set for tankers. scrappers, and brutes is also an odd design choice.  The stealth is also the set's immobilization defense, which suggests that this one was meant to be on all the time.  As stealth, I recollect it was good enough to get by; with a stealth IO or Super Speed on it lets you get past anything that Invisibility does.  It's still obviously incompatible with running Death Shroud. 

 

I get the impression that the intent was for the player to be constantly fussing at their toggles.  Turning this one on and that one off situationally.  Other sets from the early issues of the game like Invulnerability had similar issues.  I got in early enough to remember that for several weeks when I started, Invulnerability's mez protection rooted you.  Stone armor is another old set that shares this misfeature.  (Stone armor also desperately needs Stealth, of course.)  But most of the melee player base is used to the idea that toggles are turned on and stay on.   We try to crowd out Recharge in the defense and resistance sets, because the way the toggles are used means they don't benefit from recharge; it's the least desirable stat.  Having a toggle drop is usually an endurance failure and an immediate disaster.  We don't fuss with toggles, so armorsets that expect you too break the pattern and seem clunky and difficult. 

Edited April 26, 2020 by Heraclea
sp

[ArchVileTerror]

@Cutter.

 

Just . . . Cutter.

 

Everything that was said by Cutter.  Do it.  That person knows their Dark Armour!  Trust that person.

[Jeneki]

5 hours ago, Heraclea said:

Whenever I have made a Dark anything character, I have always taken care to recolor all of the associated funks and fogs hot pink.  It helps. 

Feather Boa Armor ftw.

[Myrmidon]

4 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

 I don’t want all sets to end up as TW/bio.

I am certain that your wish will be granted in Page 6, since TW isn’t likely to survive that in its current state.

[Yomo Kimyata]

6 hours ago, SwitchFade said:

What you may be missing is...

 

Not that DA shouldn't have it's unique mechanics and balance considerations, but that those severe drawback should come with significant benefits 

 

As it stands, with SO's, nearly every tank primary is just as strong or STRONGER without the accompanying END issues.

 

Either make it stronger or make it less hungry.

I hear you. 

 

There are two ways they can go with fixing underperforming sets.  One way is to make everything equivalent.  T1 attack does X damage regardless of set, etc.  In that case, everyone will flock to the least resisted damage types, but at least it would be equal.  The other way is to give advantages and drawbacks, which I see that DA already has.  I really don't think it's worthwhile judging sets in terms of IO SO slotting just like I don't ask about the value of my house in 1920 dollars.  It's just not relevant.

 

But my real issue is, what is underperforming?  Is there anything that you can do with, say, Invulnerability that you simply cannot do with Dark Armor?  Solo +1/x3 content?  Solo +4/x8 content?  Solo TFs?  Teamwork at +4/x8?  ITrials?  I don't think there is anything in the game that *requires* any more from any set than it currently has.  Sure, some sets are "better" than others, but if your theme calls for Dark Armor, and the powers are sufficiently powerful to accomplish every task you want to do, why does a power need to be boosted?  I haven't tried every power combination, but everyone I've tried so far is way more than powerful enough to accomplish any goals I needed to set.  That said, I don't feel I need to solo Hamidon with my Archer/Pain corruptor, which is good, because THAT is an awful power combination. 

 

For me, concept trumps all.  If I have a concept and the combination is unplayable at what I consider "normal" play for me, then I'll lobby to fix the powers but in general, I've found everything is already powerful enough.  Just because there always has to be a shortest kid in every class doesn't mean that that kid is too short to do everything anyone else in the class can do.  

Edited April 27, 2020 by Yomo Kimyata

[SwitchFade]

2 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I hear you. 

 

There are two ways they can go with fixing underperforming sets.  One way is to make everything equivalent.  T1 attack does X damage regardless of set, etc.  In that case, everyone will flock to the least resisted damage types, but at least it would be equal.  The other way is to give advantages and drawbacks, which I see that DA already has.  I really don't think it's worthwhile judging sets in terms of IO SO slotting just like I don't ask about the value of my house in 1920 dollars.  It's just not relevant.

 

But my real issue is, what is underperforming?  Is there anything that you can do with, say, Invulnerability that you simply cannot do with Dark Armor?  Solo +1/x3 content?  Solo +4/x8 content?  Solo TFs?  Teamwork at +4/x8?  ITrials?  I don't think there is anything in the game that *requires* any more from any set than it currently has.  Sure, some sets are "better" than others, but if your theme calls for Dark Armor, and the powers are sufficiently powerful to accomplish every task you want to do, why does a power need to be boosted?  I haven't tried every power combination, but everyone I've tried so far is way more than powerful enough to accomplish any goals I needed to set.  That said, I don't feel I need to solo Hamidon with my Archer/Pain corruptor, which is good, because THAT is an awful power combination. 

 

For me, concept trumps all.  If I have a concept and the combination is unplayable at what I consider "normal" play for me, then I'll lobby to fix the powers but in general, I've found everything is already powerful enough.  Just because there always has to be a shortest kid in every class doesn't mean that that kid is too short to do everything anyone else in the class can do.  

Uh, so the point is, that DA isn't just flavor different, it's severely underperforming.

 

So much so that it's significantly un-fun for the majority.

 

I'm not voting either way, but if you want It playable in the baseline game, which is SOs, it needs either an end cost reduction or a justification of why end cost is so high. It currently has neither.

 

Making any argument based off of "shouldn't be balanced around SOs" or the equivalent, ignores a basic foundation of system mechanics, you MUST have a baseline. It cannot be io's, as this would break the game.