It doesn't "pay" to play a support character

[Myrmidon]

18 minutes ago, Crater Kate said:

But IMO, the most important lesson you can learn about City of Heroes is this: there is no wrong way to play

This cannot be stressed enough.

[Apogee]

27 minutes ago, Crater Kate said:

But IMO, the most important lesson you can learn about City of Heroes is this: there is no wrong way to play.

Unless of course if you play a /Regen. 

[LiquidBandage]

On 9/7/2020 at 3:54 AM, Diantane said:

So I created a few "dedicated" characters. Like a tank that is built for defense only. One that can take the punishment of an alpha strike. Only had the weak, unslotted, unused first attack and the strong and slotted taunt skill. Also had tough, weave, combat jumping (7 defense toggles in all). This one was a Willpower tank.

@Diantane just a couple quick things to help out.

The wiki has a good explanation of how Gauntlet (aka, punchvoke / pokevoke) works. 

https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Inherent_Powers#Gauntlet

 

When I first started playing Homecoming, I focused on one character to level to 50 (a Peacebringer). I also found a group of people that play on a fairly regular schedule (mostly leveling characters via running missions). I focused on just being an effective damage dealer in squid form. That meant I only needed to really pay attention to seven total powers wrt enhancements (Glinting Eye, Bright Nova, Stamina, Bright Nova Bolt, BN Blast, BN Scatter, BN Detonation). I fit into the group as "ranged damage dealer" and that's what I did. I could have swapped it around and focused on White Dwarf form instead (tanking/melee), but the group already had a tank. 

 

It is easier to 'neglect' initially crafting a well rounded character and just focus on one aspect (Blasters-> ranged attacks, Scrappers-> melee attacks, Defenders-> defendery things) to make a character functional to sort of bootstrap yourself into something 'more' when the character blossoms at higher levels. It is possible to be the 'complete' vision of your character from the very beginning, but you will encounter problems along the way (some villain groups employ powers that will completely exploit your weaknesses, whatever they are). With that kind of viewpoint (understanding where you are weak), you can try to form a team that can assist where your character is weak and you can compliment them in the same manner. 

 

Things that helped along the way:

Invention Origin enhancements (https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Enhancements#Invention_Origin_Enhancements)

If you visit the University (there is one in Steel Canyon), you'll find a contact that introduces you the crafting system. Step through that mission arc and near the end you get to craft an IO for free (level 25, 20, 15, 10 iirc depending on your current level). 

You get a free respec every 10 levels. With that in mind, I crafted a few level 25 & 30 IO enhancements as I leveled (accuracy, damage, recharge) and when the time came to upgrade enhancements, instead of just slotting new ones (destroying what is already there), I respec'd. When you respec, all of the enhancements you had slotted become unslotted (and you can drop into the seven tabs of your inventory). So I respec'd and mailed those enhancements to myself or dropped them into SG storage for my other characters to use as they leveled. That way I only had to make the initial expenditure and got to reuse those good enhancements on multiple characters as they leveled.

 

In general, early in a character's career I like to six slot a couple attack powers that I use frequently, then put good enhancements in there. Having a couple powers that you can reliably count on to do damage helps immensely. If you have all of your attacks 2-3 slotted, you will end up slowly wearing down opponents that in turn get to slowly wear you down. That's where the recycled IOs I mentioned above can help out immensely. There is also the option to run the Summer Blockbuster Holiday event (via LFG) to get the Overwhelming Force enhancements. Just like IOs, the Overwhelming Force set is level agnostic, so they are always active. If you get duplicates, you can play roulette with enhancement converters to see if you get the one(s) you need. 

 

For defensive things (like armor toggles), I generally only two slot (for endurance reduction) until mid-20s where I can dedicate useful enhancements to actually make it worthwhile AND not run of endurance in the process. One thing that will really help is to take a look at the Combat Attributes window and see which powers would benefit most from slotting first. Usually, if you have a power like Dark Embrace (resistance toggle from Dark Armor set) and Tough (resistance toggle from Fighting power pool) that both impact Smashing & Lethal, it helps to determine where you'll get the most bang for your buck. Then there are powers like Combat Jumping. If you look at the endurance consumption, it is something like 0.06 endurance/sec (which is miniscule compared to other toggles). You technically CAN slot an Endurance Reduction enhancement, but the impact is so incredibly insignificant it would be more impactful to just donate the influence you would have spent to some random person instead. So making smart choices about where you apply slots and what enhancements you do slot can impact your bottom line. 

 

One other thing to mention about tanking: 

As the person who usually engages the enemy first, you will learn which are the problematic mobs and which you can effectively ignore. If some straggler or random minion turns to shoot a teammate, they aren't going to shrivel up and die on the spot. If they somehow got aggro, it is an important lesson for them to learn (clean up your own messes or learn to tame your unending flow of DPS). You can try to hold all of the aggro everywhere always and forever eternal, but you will end up bursting a blood vessel somewhere. Find your own zen tanking timing & flow. Talk to your team about what you intend to do so they can react appropriately (if you need to pull a group around a corner or something). It isn't always just jump into the middle of a pack and tank your brains out. Sometimes there needs to be some nuance to how you do it (given your strengths and the capabilities of the team). 

[LiquidBandage]

To clarify, I also build characters that lean heavily into control or buffs early on in their careers too and they tend to need to rely on other sources (teammates or time to scrape them down myself) to arrest mobs. Even on those characters I focus on one damage power so I can at least solo when I need/want to. So Arcane Bolt (Sorcery power pool) as a Controller that usually does not naturally have access to damage powers or 1-2 powers from a Defender secondary. Once you get past a certain hump (usually late 20s or early 30s) you'll have some sort of self synergy that will allow you to arrest more efficiently. 

[GastlyGibus]

So, a couple things to point out for the OP.

 

On 9/7/2020 at 6:54 AM, Diantane said:

New Defenders that are playing their character like a weak blaster and not concentrating on their character's primary skill set. Tanks also do the same. Lots of attacks but can't "tank" very well.

 

So I created a few "dedicated" characters. Like a tank that is built for defense only. One that can take the punishment of an alpha strike. Only had the weak, unslotted, unused first attack and the strong and slotted taunt skill. Also had tough, weave, combat jumping (7 defense toggles in all). This one was a Willpower tank.

 

Also when I play defenders, It is focused on the primary skills (not the weak blaster). He is complete support to the team.

 

Here's the problem. The way the mechanics of the game works (that I have noticed), is that you get little to no influence or loot unless you are causing DAMAGE! After playing my tank and running a team for seven hours straight, I end up with 60,000 influence and 3 TO's. How could I possibly enhance my character with this pitiful return? Most of my slots are empty and the rest have level 15 IO's (this at security level 26). This isn't going to work. My dedicated tank that everyone loved...... has failed. He won't be able to perform as he once did. To protect the team from almost all incoming damage.

 

Now to help fix this problem I am starting to train offensive skills (the higher tier ones), but it will be a long road ahead because I can't enhance them very well. My skills won't have the correct level IO's until 35 or 40 should i decide to play him at all. It might be better to make a DPS character and die a thousand times due to the "holes" in the group.

First thing, this is all completely false. Defenders using their attacks are not "weak blasters." In fact, the argument can be made that they're more beneficial than blaster attacks, since Defenders will get more use out of a power's secondary effects. The -ToHit debuffs from Dark Blast, for example, will be significantly more powerful on a Defender than a Blaster because of Defender modifiers. As a Defender, the primary function of your attacks is not to cause damage, but to debuff enemies and make them easier for your team to handle, thus filling the role of support rather well.

With Tankers, there's a similar secondary use to their powers that's not directly stated, and that is the inherent taunt that comes with every Tanker attack. The Tanker's inherent ability of Gauntlet casts a short AoE taunt effect on critters within range with every attack they use. A Tanker running in fists flying will hold aggro significantly better than a Tanker just using Taunt, because every single one of their attacks is also taunting enemies.

 

Finally, INF earned from defeated enemies is not at all based on damage dealt. This is 100% false, otherwise door-sitting and farming wouldn't exist. If you are on a team, any defeat made by any member of your team will evenly distribute all EXP and INF to every player on the team. Even if that Blaster one-shot a minion all by themselves, everyone on the team gets credit for the defeat. There is no participation threshold for INF or EXP. All EXP, INF, and drops are evenly calculated for every member of the team. Drops are the only instance where there will be variation, but once again, drops are based on random rolls and not on participation. So for example, if a recipe has a 10% chance to drop from an enemy, and the Stalker on the team defeats the enemy in one hit, every member of the team will roll that 10% chance for the recipe, and it may even be awarded to more than one player.

All of this was designed to prevent kill-stealing, last-hitting, participation thresholds, and certain AT's being easier or harder to level on purpose. It's all intentionally designed this way to make the game fun for everyone, and to prevent arguments over loot, exp, inf, and what have you.

On 9/7/2020 at 8:32 AM, Diantane said:

If a tank is not concentrating on his job, part or all of the team could wipe. You name me any mmo where a tank can go off and kill stuff like a DPS without wiping the team.

 

LOTRO, WOW, etc. A tank is a tank - period! (unless just solo leveling)

 

The tank must keep other defenseless characters safe (blasters, PB, MM, defenders, controllers, etc. Plus melee that put most into their DPS (no defense)).

As others have stated, City of Heroes is not like any other MMO you've ever played. It's for that reason this game has such a dedicated fanbase, because there really isn't any other game like it on the market. And as stated previously, Tankers hold aggro better when attacking, and in some instances can even be very good DPS in their own right. My Bio/Claws Tanker is a DPS monster, and that's without sacrificing any of his survivability. 

 

With this game, you eventually run into a point where you cannot take any other powers except for your attacks, and by the mid 30s, you'll have so many enhancement slots you won't know where to put them. I always pick and slot my attacks as a Tanker, and it doesn't harm my survivability in any meaningful way. In City of Heroes, a Tanker that is not using their attacks to generate aggro is not tanking as effectively as they could. Run in there and punch things! Make the bad guys mad! You're a TANK, and tanks are just as capable at offense as they are at defense.

On 9/7/2020 at 8:34 AM, Diantane said:

Maybe the developers nerfed being able to collect loot at the door and that hit non-damaging characters as well.

 

If I get an equal share of the loot, then why did I only get 60k inf and 3 TO's after 7 hours of doing tons of missions with a group of 5-8 players? If they got the same, then all of those characters will go broke and stop playing the game because their character can't perform correctly.

 

I've got about 30 characters with a maximum level of 26. Most of them have less than 3,000 influence. The highest has about 50,000. The game just doesn't give rewards very well anymore.

And this is one point where I will actually agree with you to an extent. If your gaining INF solely from defeats, then yes, you're going to have a bad time. This is why a lot of players in this thread are giving guides to using the Auction House. One of my only complaints with this game is that INF from defeats is so negligible in the early game that you're pretty much forced to use the market.

 

But, despite that, the market isn't incredibly difficult or complex to learn, and you don't have to be a super-savvy marketeer to make decent cash off of it. On all of my characters, in the early game, I craft and sell all recipes and IOs that I can't use and sell them on the market. You'd be surprised at just how much INF you can make by just selling your drops at low price on the markets. My Fire/Fire Blaster on redside already has like 30 million INF in her account at level 25, and that's all from just selling drops. I'm not converting or using merits or buying things to flip them, I'm just playing the game and crafting the recipes I find to sell on the market. Even just a single piece of rare salvage sells for around 450K on the market, and I use that money to fund all of my enhancements and slotting.

 

Once you get higher in level, the INF you get from defeats increases significantly, but in the early game, I will concede that INF generation is pathetic outside of selling drops. Luckily, selling drops is super easy and trivial, and you can make yourself a multi-millionaire in INF from just selling drops on the market. The guides posted here are super helpful, and I would recommend reading them to get a better understanding of how stuff works.

Edited September 9, 2020 by GastlyGibus

[Ukase]

On 9/7/2020 at 7:32 AM, Diantane said:

If a tank is not concentrating on his job, part or all of the team could wipe. You name me any mmo where a tank can go off and kill stuff like a DPS without wiping the team.

 

LOTRO, WOW, etc. A tank is a tank - period! (unless just solo leveling)

 

The tank must keep other defenseless characters safe (blasters, PB, MM, defenders, controllers, etc. Plus melee that put most into their DPS (no defense)).

Impatient fool that I am - I wrote about a full page - and then...scrolled back up and saw that Nemu and InvaderStych told you the same things I wrote. What they didn't tell you is that there is a player 
called @Yomo Kimyata on these forums who has more influence than everyone else put together. Well - maybe not EVERYONE, but he's pretty well off. He has a post here https://forums.homecomingservers.com/search/?q=Yomo&quick=1

where he states if you email him, he will send you 20 million inf, no questions asked. That would get you started. He also has written several guides on how you, too, can make a lot of influence, quickly, and fairly simply. In game, you can reach him at @yomo. 

[srmalloy]

On 9/7/2020 at 3:54 AM, Diantane said:

Here's the problem. The way the mechanics of the game works (that I have noticed), is that you get little to no influence or loot unless you are causing DAMAGE!

This is not true; everyone on a team gets the same base XP and influence (modified by XP boosts, patrol experience, etc.), and the drops are entirely random per individual (again modified by various boosts, like the ones for day jobs).

 

Now, where this becomes heavily true is when you are dealing with a league. In this case, all the members of a team in the league get the same base XP and influence, but the XP allocated to a team depends on how much damage the team did within the league. I have noticed this most severely during Hamidon raids. These break out, at a minimum, four teams -- a taunt team, made up of tanks (and occasional brutes) with a healer, a melee team (more tanks, scrappers, brutes, and stalkers), a ranged team (blasters, sentinels, etc.; primary qualification is having ranged attacks), and a hold team (controllers, doms, etc; primary qualification is having holds). The taunt team taunts the yellow mitos and Hami, the melee team kills the taunted yellow mitos (which need melee attacks to damage them), the hold team kills the green mitos (which have to be held before they can be damaged), and the blue team kills the blue mitos (which need ranged attacks to damage them)

 

This inherently produces disparate XP rewards. The blue team will zip around killing its mitos, and then gang up to help the green team. Since the green team's holds do little damage, they get little of the XP when a mito goes down. To illustrate, when I've done Hami raids on a blaster, I will generally get 30k-55k XP per blue mito (times six blues), and 20k-30k XP per green mito (times 5-6 greens). When I've done a Hami raid with a controller, I get between 6k and 8K per mito (times six greens). The taunt team has a similar issue, as they generate no damage until after their assigned mito is down and they can join the melee team; the melee team has a smaller penalty, as they generally only fight the six yellow mitos.  All of which make doing Hamidon raids a crappy source of XP for controllers, doms, and the taunt tanks, even running three raids in an evening, and dropping two sets of mitos before taking out the Hamidon nucleus. The raid rewards are the same regardless, though -- a random HO (once), or four Empyrean merits (once), or 60/40/40 reward merits (first/second/third time that reward picked).

[Razor Cure]

14 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

This is not true; everyone on a team gets the same base XP and influence (modified by XP boosts, patrol experience, etc.), and the drops are entirely random per individual (again modified by various boosts, like the ones for day jobs).

 

Now, where this becomes heavily true is when you are dealing with a league.

This also happens on Mothership Raids. A team with a few trollers, and tanks running of to herd (dont even get me started of lazy players who just go afk), will get far less xp and merits than a team of ranged blasters.

Also, user experience, but doing incarnate trials, I have noticed a big drop in reward quality when playing support toons (especially my emp fender, who doesnt attack). The emp had to do about 30+ BAFs (on Live) to get a rare, when all my other toons would usually get one within 5, or at most 10 runs.

 

Although I don't agree with teh OP, they DO have a point that the basic rewards, especially money, from 1-50 are crap. I really noticed this back on Live when my first lvl 50 hero did not even have enough money to get all my level 50 SOs. Obviously now we have IOs, but since the game is not balanced on them..surely getting to 50 should at least give you enough cash to get your full kit of SOs every 5 levels.

 

[Hedgefund]

7 hours ago, Razor Cure said:

Also, user experience, but doing incarnate trials, I have noticed a big drop in reward quality when playing support toons (especially my emp fender, who doesnt attack). The emp had to do about 30+ BAFs (on Live) to get a rare, when all my other toons would usually get one within 5, or at most 10 runs

That's the whims of the RNGods, nothing more, nothing less.

[Grindingsucks]

I would say that if it happens consistently only when playing support toons (and to clarify, I have no idea if it does or not.  I rarely do big league task forces, as I don't enjoy them), then it is more than simple RNG shennanigans.  Of course, we've all felt that the RNG was screwing us over at one point or another.  When you have a 95% chance to hit against an enemy that is white to you, and you miss with that attack 3 times in a row, you do start to wonder.  8P

[Hedgefund]

Fine, show some t-tests if you want to say probabilities are different.  I had 2 Electric toons (armor and affinity [a Defender]) that each got 10 VRs in their first 30 menu choices.  So I'll conclude that the RNG favors electric powersets (note - I know this sounds ridiculous and that's the point).

[Luminara]

1 hour ago, Grindingsucks said:

When you have a 95% chance to hit against an enemy that is white to you, and you miss with that attack 3 times in a row, you do start to wonder.

 

The only situation when that can occur is when the player is using AoEs and there's more than one target.  The streak breaker doesn't check to verify that X number of targets were missed in an AoE, thus forcing Y number of additional targets to be hit, nor does it count AoE targets when determining whether to force a hit on the subsequent roll.  So this is possible.

 

However, it's also highly unlikely, simply because using only a single AoE three times in a row would entail an incredibly slow pace (even using Brawl and the inherent origin power would drastically speed things up), and be ridiculously boring.  Additionally, as each target in an AoE is checked individually, the likelihood of missing that one target, at 95% chance to hit and with multiple targets in the radius, three times a row would be tiny.

 

You're much more likely to miss a specific critter if you're mixing single-target and AoE in your attack chain, but it's still infrequent.

[Grindingsucks]

1 hour ago, Hedgefund said:

Fine, show some t-tests if you want to say probabilities are different.  I had 2 Electric toons (armor and affinity [a Defender]) that each got 10 VRs in their first 30 menu choices.  So I'll conclude that the RNG favors electric powersets (note - I know this sounds ridiculous and that's the point).

Don't get me wrong.  I don't actually know and I'm certainly not a numbers guy.  I do experience the feeling that the RNG is acting wonky sometimes, but that may merely be my perception based on whatever circumstances are at the time.  I mostly think this because of times I scroll back through the combat tab and examine the results.  There may be more going on under the hood that what the text message is relating to you, though.  🤷‍♂️

 

[Healix]

I still find that trollers and fenders are important. They are no longer squishy and dependent on teams for survival, but they add to mishs on many levels. 

I was amazed that my ill/emp actually soloed her iTrial mish with the Captain and Honoree. (even my tanks didn't do as well) She confused the Riktis and the Captain till all the Riktis were dead and Honoree turned blue, then sent her phantoms in to finish off the captain. After that experience, I have helped many friends with it. (Way more fun than dying over and over LOL)

I am not a stats person, and my builds are trial and error. I Just play for fun and learn as I go.

[EmmySky]

15 minutes ago, Healix said:

(Way more fun than dying over and over LOL)

Need proof.

 

My merc/emo MM is currently soloing DA....is that the iTrial you mean?  Is it still soloing if I have 6 buff men following me around?

[Healix]

[Twisted Toon]

4 hours ago, EmmySky said:

Need proof.

 

My merc/emo MM is currently soloing DA....is that the iTrial you mean?  Is it still soloing if I have 6 buff men following me around?

I think it's the Alpha Incarnate arc from Mender Ramiel in Oro, that was being referenced.

[srmalloy]

On 9/9/2020 at 8:17 PM, Razor Cure said:

This also happens on Mothership Raids. A team with a few trollers, and tanks running of to herd (dont even get me started of lazy players who just go afk), will get far less xp and merits than a team of ranged blasters.

I'm not sure that the game is coded in a way that would allow XP to be shared evenly across all members of a league, but it would be a more equitable solution to do so than restricting XP sharing to be within teams only.

[Llewellyn Blackwell]

28 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

I'm not sure that the game is coded in a way that would allow XP to be shared evenly across all members of a league, but it would be a more equitable solution to do so than restricting XP sharing to be within teams only.

Nope just kind of tells you if the leader of the msr is cool or a dick bag. A good MSR leader spreads out AOE ATs among the teams to help insure everyone gets a good amount of merits. IME if your on a MSR and not getting good merit drops, its likely that you have a lot of afkers with just one pbaoe or pet summon on auto and are just milking it for easy, rather then try harding for the team as a whole.