Yet another Psi Armor set suggestion!

[EmperorSteele]

We already have fire armor, ice armor, dark armor, invincibility, etc etc. Time for some straight up Psychic armor! Available to all armor ATs, naturally. My idea is for it to be slightly under-tuned defensively in favor of gimmicks and flavor, but with enough different powers to make it a beast if properly kitted out. Numbers shown here are Tanker numbers, and thus, less for other ATs.

T1: Mental Fortitude. Auto. Gives a small amount of smashing, lethal, and psychic resistance (10% S/L, 15% PSI).
T2:  Mind Over Matter. Toggle. With some effort, you can ignore some of the damage that comes your way. 25% PSI, 20% S/L, 15% C/D/E/F. Also grants a small boost to regeneration (25%).
T3: Sense Danger. Auto. You know when and how your enemy is going to strike, giving you the opportunity to dodge their attacks. +7.5% Defense to melee, ranged, and Psychic attacks. +15% Psi Res (unenhanceable).
T4: Hivemind. Click. You link minds with your teammates, allowing you all to become a more formidable fighting force for a short time. You and each member of your team gain 1.5% Defense (all) and ToHit for each member of your team within 60 feet of you, yourself included (So a maximum buff of 12% each if all seven of your teammates are within range, and that's without enhancements!). Lasts for 45 seconds, has a 160 second recharge.
T5: Indomitable Mind. Toggle. You become highly resistant to Confusion, Hold, Immobilization, Sleep, Stun, and Terrorize effects (Mag 10). Grants an additional 15% Psi res as well.
T6: World of Confusion. PBAoE Toggle. You weave disruptive psionic energy all around yourself, clouding the minds of nearby opponents (10 feet) and forcing them to attack one another. Every 6 seconds: 100% chance for Mag 1 confuse for 6 seconds and 5 points of psionic damage. 10% chance for an additional 1 Mag of Confusion for 6 seconds. Also works as a Taunt aura.
T7: Telekinetic Shield. Click. You're able to use some low-grade telekinesis to deflect attacks and hold your ground. +12.5% Ranged/Melee/Psi defense, +4pts KB res, +20% Absorb. Lasts for 60 seconds. Recharge: 90 seconds. By taking this power, you also automatically gain +20% Defense Debuff resistance and 10% Psionic damage resistance (Unenhanceable). If made "perma" or better, the absorb shield and KB res will stack (max of 3 stacks), but the defense value will not.
T8: Lethargy Aura Generation. Toggle. You weave disruptive psionic energy which affects your opponents' ability to move and act. All foes within 10 feet suffer -50% movement speed, -25% recharge speed, -10% Defense, and have a 20% chance of falling asleep for 6 seconds (Mag 3). Works as a taunt aura.
T9: Astral Projection. Click-toggle. You're able to leave your body for a short time (90 seconds) in the form of a psionic "ghost" of yourself. In this form, you are invisible (until you attack), and nearly indestructible, but do not deal a lot of damage. However, you are able to hit phased targets. Also, your real body will remain vulnerable to attack, and you cannot wander too far from it (90 feet). The other powers in this set do not affect this form, only your actual body. If you die while in this form, you awaken in your body with half HP and no endurance, with your regen and recovery floored for a few moments. You can detoggle this power early to avoid the crash. If your real body starts taking damage, this power may automatically end early (25% chance when health dips below 75%; 50% chance when Current HP is at 50%; 100% chance when Current HP is at 25% or less). The shock of this may force one or two of your powers to detoggle.

• Astral Projection Stats: Invisibility; Auto Flight of 75mph; 40% Def vs ALL, 65% Res Vs All (75% vs PSI); + 250% regen. Immune to Mez and Knockback. 100% debuff resistance (all). Damage debuffed by 50%, is converted to psionic damage, and has 50% heal-back after 10 seconds. In addition to the expected Endurance and Recharge reduction enhancements, this power also takes Defense, Damage, Healing, Fly-speed and Resistance enhancements to boost its stats.

Hope this seems like a suggestion worth entertaining! It can't reach any caps on its own, but with the right enhancements or supplemental pool powers, it (is supposed to be) quite formidable. What do you all think?


 

[ExoGrimz]

7 minutes ago, EmperorSteele said:

under-tuned defensively

I don't know about you, but 55% psi resist naturally seems a bit much... considering I got the impression psi resist is something most armor sets lack.

[Outrider_01]

11 minutes ago, ExoGrimz said:

I don't know about you, but 55% psi resist naturally seems a bit much... considering I got the impression psi resist is something most armor sets lack.

Looks kind of like Ice armor; Melee/Range defense, a PAoE slow, Absorb and weakness to almost every other damage type.  Basically, it will get ripped apart with anything not S/L resist (low numbers, probably around 60% with IO bonus) or Psi when it hits.  But the E/N/T damage type are covered with Melee/Range defense checks which they are pretty common, as there are few PBAoE Neg attacks used by NPC while Eng blast/melee are pretty common for melee/range; toxic unless spines/darts ect can be avoided if positional checked but painful if untyped.  Semi-balanced, but it has too many positives in resist or defense combined.....the melee defense needs to go as it can be covered with the Lethargy Aura or World of Confusion (can't really taunt with it, it does a confuse check against attacking other NPC and since they are not attacking you can't taunt if the check succeeds twice against anything higher then minion)  in melee range and the click recharge is kind of powerful with its long duration in regards to its recharge; 60 rec to 90 is perma since 30 to 90 is possible without a huge investment in recharge (boost range for example, 30 second up 90 sec recharge).

[General Idiot]

The main problem with a psychic armor set is how do you differentiate it from Willpower, which is pretty much already that concept in a lot of ways. Even this suggestion has two powers that are barely renamed copies of powers from Willpower. Mechanically the other seven powers have different effects, sure, but they're all pulling from the same conceptual space - the whole mind over matter bit that we already have a set for.

 

On a more practical note - having melee and ranged defense but no AoE is extremely bad when almost every mob has an aoe of some kind. Having psi defense explicitly when you already have positionals is going to do literally nothing against all but a tiny few powers that don't have proper positional tags and honestly those are more likely a bug than anything.

 

Astral projection seems way too gimmicky to be actually useful most of the time, and I'm not sure the game engine can actually do what it requires - it'd have to spawn your body as a seperate entity, make all your running toggles affect that entity instead of yourself, keep track of that entity's health to affect you in turn, teleport you back to the body's location when it expires... I love the concept of it but it'd be a nightmare to implement, if it'd work at all.

[Replacement]

Neat idea but your numbers are way high.

 

T2 is two full resist toggles of power budget.

T3 would be fine without the psi resist.

T4 is fine in a bubble, but should probably be skewed towards fewer allies - e.g. 3.5% defense/tohit +1% per ally.

 

I'm not a fan of the design paradigm of being op at 50 and fully kitted out but you "paid for it" by door sitting a few hours at the AE.

 

Once perma, this set as currently written provides more defense than SR.

[EmperorSteele]

Thanks for the responses, all!! Looks like it's back to the drawing board; but first, some counters 😃

If you look at Fire Armor, you get 90% Fire resistance in 3 powers, two of which are auto, and with NO resistance slotting. Ice armor is similar, except to cold damage, naturally. Elec is almost there against energy damage, but makes up for it with good res to everything else; no defense, though. Dark and Rad offer good resists all around, especially to PSI (50%), though again, not much defense, if any. Bio's (unenhanced) numbers aren't that great, but everyone sings it's praises because of damage auras and +damage effects. Invuln's numbers were actually lower than I thought, giving only 40% S/L res without enhancements (and like 10% of the other stuff). I also thought Super Reflex's numbers were higher; I thought it's whole THING was that you can be defcapped with minimal slotting investment, but it actually only gets you halfway there. That's a disappointment. So I'm gonna do a downward tweak of the numbers to put them more in-line with other sets.

As for Willpower, it's not psychic armor, even though two of its powers take their name from the Psi APP. It's just one of few sets that actually offers any mitigation to psionics at all. It's got good psi def, but not a whole lot of psi res. That said, I purposefully tried to make this set different from Willpower in every other way, and make it actually feel like someone who's using psionic powers to defend themselves, and not just someone who's mentally tough. That said, it's a valid contention and comparison, one I'll try to address when I'm back at the drawing board!

Also, I wasn't aware that "almost every mob" had an AoE (that isn't also a ranged attack; or do powers like "Fireball" not have a ranged flag?). The AoE weak spot was intentional, as it's one thing to dodge an attack you know is coming your way, but how do you dodge an attack that hits your friend and then explodes near you? Or that erupts from the bad guy itself and goes out in every direction? Though I guess if you know WHAT's coming, you could brace yourself for it.

As for astral projection: It's something that could be coded in, using doppelganger tech. The HC staff have shown off their programing chops, so ideas that "can't be done now with existing tech" aren't necessarily off the table 😃

Thanks again all; Revision coming soon!

Edited June 12, 2021 by EmperorSteele
typo

[arcane]

2 hours ago, Replacement said:

Neat idea but your numbers are way high.

 

T2 is two full resist toggles of power budget.

T3 would be fine without the psi resist.

T4 is fine in a bubble, but should probably be skewed towards fewer allies - e.g. 3.5% defense/tohit +1% per ally.

 

I'm not a fan of the design paradigm of being op at 50 and fully kitted out but you "paid for it" by door sitting a few hours at the AE.

 

Once perma, this set as currently written provides more defense than SR.

People usually are a bit too generous on the numbers when they haven’t been paying attention to how devs pick values since 2004.

 

I could see this being necessary because Willpower doesn’t really get all that into all the psionic type concepts you could want, but it’s pretty questionable that two of the power names proposed are synonymous with Mind Over Body and Indomitable Will. I like the thought of an armor set with World of Confusion though.

[EmperorSteele]

V2; how's this?

T1: Mental Fortitude. Auto. Gives a small amount of smashing, lethal, and psychic resistance (15% PSI, 10% S/L).

T2:  Mind Over Matter. Toggle. With some effort, you can ignore some of the damage that comes your way. 20% PSI, 10% vs everything else. Also grants a 25% boost to regeneration. (Changed some numbers, added Toxic resist)

T3: Sense Danger. Auto. You know when and how your enemy is going to strike, giving you the opportunity to dodge their attacks. +5% Defense vs AoE, Melee, Ranged, and Psi attacks. (Added AoE defense, removed PSI resistance)

T4: Hivemind. Click. You link minds with your allies, allowing you all to become a more formidable fighting force for a short time. The buff scales with the number of allies that are nearby when you cast this ability (max 7). If it's just you, you gain 3% Def (all) and ToHit. With 7 allies (within 60 feet), you and all your allies gain 10% Def (all) and ToHit. Lasts for 45 seconds, has a 160 second recharge. The buff only checks for a maximum of 7 allies, but will affect any number of allies in range. (Changed numbers for a higher minimum effect and lower maximum effect)

T5: Indomitable Mind. Toggle. You become highly resistant to Confusion, Hold, Immobilization, Sleep, Stun, and Terrorize effects (Mag 10). Grants an additional 15% Psi res as well.

T6: World of Confusion. PBAoE Toggle. You weave disruptive psionic energy all around yourself, clouding the minds of nearby opponents (10 feet) and forcing them to attack one another. Every 6 seconds: 100% chance for Mag 1 confuse for 4 seconds and 5 points of psionic damage. 10% chance for an additional 1 Mag of Confusion for 4 seconds. Also works as a Taunt aura. (Reduced confuse duration so that slotting is required to make perma, and/or allow taunt effect to do its job)

T7: Telekinetic Shield. Click. You're able to use some low-grade telekinesis to deflect attacks and hold your ground. +5% AoE/Melee/Range/Psi defense, +4pts KB res, +20% Absorb. Lasts for 60 seconds. Recharge: 105 seconds. By taking this power, you also automatically gain +20% Defense Debuff resistance and 5% S/L damage resistance (Unenhanceable). If made "perma" or better, the absorb shield and KB res will stack (max of 2 stacks), but the defense value will not. (slightly increased recharge, reduced defense numbers and number of absorb stacks, changed Psi res to S/L res and lowered it some)

T8: Lethargy Aura Generation. PBAoE Toggle. You weave disruptive psionic energy which affects your opponents' ability to move and act. All foes within 10 feet suffer -50% movement speed, -25% recharge speed, -10% Defense, and have a 33% chance of falling asleep for 3 seconds (Mag 3). Works as a taunt aura. (Increased sleep chance, reduced sleep duration)

T9: Astral Projection. Click-toggle. You're able to leave your body for a short time (90 seconds) in the form of a psionic "ghost" of yourself. In this form, you are invisible (until you attack), and nearly indestructible, but do not deal a lot of damage. However, you are able to hit phased targets. Also, your real body will remain vulnerable to attack, and you cannot wander too far from it (90 feet). The other powers in this set do not affect this form, only your actual body. If you die while in this form, you awaken in your body with half HP and no endurance, with your regen and recovery floored for a few moments. You can detoggle this power early to avoid the crash. If your real body starts taking damage, this power may automatically end early (25% chance when health dips below 75%; 50% chance when Current HP is at 50%; 100% chance when Current HP is at 25% or less). The shock of this may force one or two of your powers to detoggle.

• Astral Projection Stats: Invisibility; Auto Flight of 75mph; 40% Def vs ALL, 65% Res Vs All (75% vs PSI); + 250% regen. Immune to Mez and Knockback. 100% debuff resistance (all). Damage debuffed by 50%, is converted to psionic damage, and has 50% heal-back after 10 seconds. In addition to the expected Endurance and Recharge reduction enhancements, this power also takes Defense, Damage, Healing, Fly-speed and Resistance enhancements to boost its stats.

T9 (alternate): Psionic Projection. Psuedopet. You gather all your psychic power and coalesce it into a single space, creating an semi-illusionary duplicate of yourself to hassle and confuse your foes. It has a high taunt aura and is hard to kill (90% def vs ALL), but it deals low damage (75% base damage of your attacks, but converted to PSI damage, half of which is healed after 10 seconds) and requires focus to maintain. While it is up, you have a -25% damage debuff and -25% Res vs All debufff applied to yourself. Lasts for 60 seconds, has a 300 second recharge. (New idea if Astral Projection is untenable. Conceptually similar, but doesn't lock you out of acting. Question: Do we allow it to be buffed like a normal pet, or untargetable like Phantom Army?)

 

***

So the numbers are a little more under control and in line with other tanker sets. Without enhancements, we have 50% Psi res, 25% S/L, and 10% everything else (Again, Tanker values. Everyone else would see 40/20/7.5 respectively). Maximum defense (unslotted) is 20%, which requires a full team and isn't permanent without slotting/building for it. I didn't remove the melee defense from the Def powers because I want people to be free to skip powers without being overly punished for it, though I did add AoE defense in so it's not such a huge hole. Reduced the control numbers a bit, too. Added an alternate T9 which is a similar concept, but functions more like a one-man Phantom Army.

Does this look better, or is it still off the mark?

[MTeague]

I always considered Super Reflexes to be Psychic Armor.  You sense the bullet coming before it's even been fired, and move.

Or Energy Aura, if you want a "Force Field Armor" powered by your mind. 

[dangeraaron10]

I definitely think there's room for a Psi specialist Armor set, much like how Fire is considered broadly squishy but specialized for Fire damage.

 

You put quite a lot of thought and work into this idea, and while the numbers can be adjusted, it's a solid foundation.

 

Psi Aura isn't high on my list of power sets I want, but I could definitely get behind it.  In terms of theme, being a Psi specialist would put you in another level over Super Reflexes as your trained (or mutated, runed, amplified, or microchipped) mind blocks Psi attacks specifically, making you a Psionic Hunter of sorts.  

[PainX]

psi specialist will have to mean abit more then just resistance though dark armor handily gets to hard capped psi resist on a tanker 

[Monos King]

9 hours ago, EmperorSteele said:

V2; how's this?

T1: Mental Fortitude. Auto. Gives a small amount of smashing, lethal, and psychic resistance (15% PSI, 10% S/L).

T2:  Mind Over Matter. Toggle. With some effort, you can ignore some of the damage that comes your way. 20% PSI, 10% vs everything else. Also grants a 25% boost to regeneration. (Changed some numbers, added Toxic resist)

T3: Sense Danger. Auto. You know when and how your enemy is going to strike, giving you the opportunity to dodge their attacks. +5% Defense vs AoE, Melee, Ranged, and Psi attacks. (Added AoE defense, removed PSI resistance)

T4: Hivemind. Click. You link minds with your allies, allowing you all to become a more formidable fighting force for a short time. The buff scales with the number of allies that are nearby when you cast this ability (max 7). If it's just you, you gain 3% Def (all) and ToHit. With 7 allies (within 60 feet), you and all your allies gain 10% Def (all) and ToHit. Lasts for 45 seconds, has a 160 second recharge. The buff only checks for a maximum of 7 allies, but will affect any number of allies in range. (Changed numbers for a higher minimum effect and lower maximum effect)

T5: Indomitable Mind. Toggle. You become highly resistant to Confusion, Hold, Immobilization, Sleep, Stun, and Terrorize effects (Mag 10). Grants an additional 15% Psi res as well.

T6: World of Confusion. PBAoE Toggle. You weave disruptive psionic energy all around yourself, clouding the minds of nearby opponents (10 feet) and forcing them to attack one another. Every 6 seconds: 100% chance for Mag 1 confuse for 4 seconds and 5 points of psionic damage. 10% chance for an additional 1 Mag of Confusion for 4 seconds. Also works as a Taunt aura. (Reduced confuse duration so that slotting is required to make perma, and/or allow taunt effect to do its job)

T7: Telekinetic Shield. Click. You're able to use some low-grade telekinesis to deflect attacks and hold your ground. +5% AoE/Melee/Range/Psi defense, +4pts KB res, +20% Absorb. Lasts for 60 seconds. Recharge: 105 seconds. By taking this power, you also automatically gain +20% Defense Debuff resistance and 5% S/L damage resistance (Unenhanceable). If made "perma" or better, the absorb shield and KB res will stack (max of 2 stacks), but the defense value will not. (slightly increased recharge, reduced defense numbers and number of absorb stacks, changed Psi res to S/L res and lowered it some)

T8: Lethargy Aura Generation. PBAoE Toggle. You weave disruptive psionic energy which affects your opponents' ability to move and act. All foes within 10 feet suffer -50% movement speed, -25% recharge speed, -10% Defense, and have a 33% chance of falling asleep for 3 seconds (Mag 3). Works as a taunt aura. (Increased sleep chance, reduced sleep duration)

T9: Astral Projection. Click-toggle. You're able to leave your body for a short time (90 seconds) in the form of a psionic "ghost" of yourself. In this form, you are invisible (until you attack), and nearly indestructible, but do not deal a lot of damage. However, you are able to hit phased targets. Also, your real body will remain vulnerable to attack, and you cannot wander too far from it (90 feet). The other powers in this set do not affect this form, only your actual body. If you die while in this form, you awaken in your body with half HP and no endurance, with your regen and recovery floored for a few moments. You can detoggle this power early to avoid the crash. If your real body starts taking damage, this power may automatically end early (25% chance when health dips below 75%; 50% chance when Current HP is at 50%; 100% chance when Current HP is at 25% or less). The shock of this may force one or two of your powers to detoggle.

• Astral Projection Stats: Invisibility; Auto Flight of 75mph; 40% Def vs ALL, 65% Res Vs All (75% vs PSI); + 250% regen. Immune to Mez and Knockback. 100% debuff resistance (all). Damage debuffed by 50%, is converted to psionic damage, and has 50% heal-back after 10 seconds. In addition to the expected Endurance and Recharge reduction enhancements, this power also takes Defense, Damage, Healing, Fly-speed and Resistance enhancements to boost its stats.

T9 (alternate): Psionic Projection. Psuedopet. You gather all your psychic power and coalesce it into a single space, creating an semi-illusionary duplicate of yourself to hassle and confuse your foes. It has a high taunt aura and is hard to kill (90% def vs ALL), but it deals low damage (75% base damage of your attacks, but converted to PSI damage, half of which is healed after 10 seconds) and requires focus to maintain. While it is up, you have a -25% damage debuff and -25% Res vs All debufff applied to yourself. Lasts for 60 seconds, has a 300 second recharge. (New idea if Astral Projection is untenable. Conceptually similar, but doesn't lock you out of acting. Question: Do we allow it to be buffed like a normal pet, or untargetable like Phantom Army?)

 

***

So the numbers are a little more under control and in line with other tanker sets. Without enhancements, we have 50% Psi res, 25% S/L, and 10% everything else (Again, Tanker values. Everyone else would see 40/20/7.5 respectively). Maximum defense (unslotted) is 20%, which requires a full team and isn't permanent without slotting/building for it. I didn't remove the melee defense from the Def powers because I want people to be free to skip powers without being overly punished for it, though I did add AoE defense in so it's not such a huge hole. Reduced the control numbers a bit, too. Added an alternate T9 which is a similar concept, but functions more like a one-man Phantom Army.

Does this look better, or is it still off the mark?

I mean I love it just from it's uniqueness. I think it would be fun to play particularly with that revised t9. 

[Aiax]

A bit of thread necro, but had a few ideas about psi armour, well three ideas anyway, certainly not as in depth as you have done.

 

1 - I always thought that psi armour should be defensive based. Going with the idea mentioned above that you sense/anticipate how your enemy will attack you and you avoid it.

 

2 - If there is any armour that should have no cc holes, psi armour would be it. So please, no confuse or fear or repel etc.. holes.

 

3 - For the taunt aura, I thought a power called Weak Minded would be a different unique idea. Essentially, anyone affected by the aura becomes more susceptible to the secondary effects of your powers (and maybe teammates).  A bit like a reverse power boost, instead of boosting your powers, your enemies becomes weak to them. So things like fears, disorients, slows, -to hit, - dmg, etc either have a greater chance to land or the duration is increased, just not sure what to do about fire....

 

Anyways just a few ideas that were floating around in my head. Figured it would be better adding to an existing thread than starting a new one.

[plainguy]

On 9/24/2021 at 12:55 PM, Aiax said:

A bit of thread necro, but had a few ideas about psi armour, well three ideas anyway, certainly not as in depth as you have done

Anyways just a few ideas that were floating around in my head. Figured it would be better adding to an existing thread than starting a new one.

Absolutely correct !