Buff lvl 40+ Circle of Thorn

[nihilii]

In the teens, CoT is a powerhouse. Ruin Mages have bubbles and Earthquake. Ghosts with tohit debuffs are all over the place.

 

By the 20-30s, they're still a force to be reckoned with. Hellfrosts, Succubi, minions with defense debuffs, minions with slows. Agony Mages healing their friends.

Then by level 45+, they become a joke. It's all straight damage, with Death Mages doing a little bit extra, but not enough on their own.

You could scale the very same low level and mid level enemies all the way to level 50, without giving them any extra power, and the resulting Circle of Thorn would be a significantly tougher faction.

It doesn't have to be exactly that, but can we do something to help the guys in robes? Their highlevel disgrace makes me feel bad when I hit them in the face.

Edited February 24, 2023 by nihilii

[Mr. Vee]

I think it's nice having options. You've got your cakewalk with council and your tougher options with arachnos, malta and carnies. CoT are a bit tougher than council and have more bosses. So they're the xp sweet spot for the high 40's. I'd routinely solo their papers when leveling a toon if no one was around to run something with.

[Uun]

I'm in favor of this. What if you were to have Possessed Scientists appear in missions? They're already scaled lvl 40-54.

[Luminara]

5 hours ago, nihilii said:

Then by level 45+, they become a joke. It's all straight damage, with Death Mages doing a little bit extra, but not enough on their own.

 

Death Mages have Twilight Grasp, Dark Pit and Chill of the Night.  At */x8, spawns can have up to three Death Mages.  Three Death Mages debuffing your ToHit, healing the entire spawn and stacking Stuns on you.

 

Ice Thorn Casters stack Slows.

 

CoT aren't just damage at 45+.

 

5 hours ago, Mr. Vee said:

I think it's nice having options. You've got your cakewalk with council and your tougher options with arachnos, malta and carnies. CoT are a bit tougher than council and have more bosses.

 

This.  We don't need everything in the game to be ZOMGSOHARD, we need exactly what we have, different groups offering different challenges.  And an enemy group with a boss who can heal the entire spawn, neuter a character's ToHit, and mez squishies, working in concert with minions who floor recharge times, is challenging enough for plenty of people.

[Yomo Kimyata]

Well, it seems to me that different builds are going to have different hurdles.  If you have to hit debuff resistance and confuse resistance, then yes, CoT are roughly Council difficulty at +4/x8 at 40+.

 

Now what we *could* do is replace all CoT with Crey, who really got buffed up recently, at level 40+.  Then we'd really be cooking!

[El D]

4 hours ago, Uun said:

I'm in favor of this. What if you were to have Possessed Scientists appear in missions? They're already scaled lvl 40-54.

 

I wouldn't mind expanding this concept in-particular - both more broadly for high level missions and into lower-level mobs since the Circle show up just about everywhere. The CoT's entire shtick is 'implant ancient wizard souls into people's bodies' so why don't we run into a wider variety of "Possessed NPC' mobs? Possessed PPD officers, University professors/students, Midnighter agents, Longbow operatives, Legacy Chain members...

 

Make it pull randomly from a pool of 'human' mobs, have it slap the green eyes aura on them along with a random Caster/Mage powerset, and give them a chance to appear in standard mission/open world spawns. Have them be the Quantums of the Circle of Thorns, essentially.

Edited February 24, 2023 by El D

[Rudra]

33 minutes ago, El D said:

 

I wouldn't mind expanding this concept in-particular - both more broadly for high level missions and into lower-level mobs since the Circle show up just about everywhere. The CoT's entire shtick is 'implant ancient wizard souls into people's bodies' so why don't we run into a wider variety of "Possessed NPC' mobs? Possessed PPD officers, University professors/students, Midnighter agents, Longbow operatives, Legacy Chain members...

 

Make it pull randomly from a pool of 'human' mobs, have it slap the green eyes aura on them along with a random Caster/Mage powerset, and give them a chance to appear in standard mission/open world spawns. Have them be the Quantums of the Circle of Thorns, essentially.

Every human CoT you see is a possessed NPC. They are kept generic in most cases. (Crash Cage being the one exception I can think of currently. [Edit: Also the possessed Arachnos in Cap au Diable.]) The possessed scientists are in an area and time where and when the CoT seems to be trying to expand their knowledge base. I don't have any real issues with the possessed scientists being more visible, as in showing up in more places. I would however, keep them limited to their current level 40+ levels and only in missions where their presence makes sense. Which would be any mission where science and magic clash, such as if and when Portal Corps and CoT portals have an overlap or the CoT in the Shadow Shard.

Edited February 24, 2023 by Rudra

[Wavicle]

Council first lol

[Captain Fabulous]

I dunno man, I've always found lvl 40+ CoT to be a royal pain in the tuchus. Massive stacking of debuffs.

[nihilii]

1 hour ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

If you have to hit debuff resistance and confuse resistance, then yes, CoT are roughly Council difficulty at +4/x8 at 40+.

FWIW I actually tend to run super tight characters for accuracy, aiming for 95% tohit against +3s (given finalized builds are alphashifted) and no more.

 

Yet even when leveling, +4 death mages don't seem to pose much of a threat.

A simple event motivated me to (finally) post this. I went AFK entering a CoT tip mission. Came back 10 minutes later to see a +3/x8 ambush whacking on me, still at half life. This is silly. Level 30 CoT (or whichever level range gets the quicksand guys) upscaled to level 50 would have destroyed this character through defense debuffs.

Fundamentally, I don't see the logic in arguing level 50 CoT should be weaker than level 20 CoT. Not quoting you specifically here Yomo, not even subquoting anyone else, I just don't see the logic either from a game design rationale or from an ingame universe rationale.

Edited February 24, 2023 by nihilii

[357trall]

Just allowing the Succubi to scale up to 54 would add punch to the COT, they are rather nasty with their aoe damage and placate/confuse(provided I am remembering their powers correctly). The Hellfrosts and elemental mages would be nice, if only for variety.

[Yomo Kimyata]

45 minutes ago, nihilii said:

A simple event motivated me to (finally) post this. I went AFK entering a CoT tip mission. Came back 10 minutes later to see a +3/x8 ambush whacking on me, still at half life. This is silly. Level 30 CoT (or whichever level range gets the quicksand guys) upscaled to level 50 would have destroyed this character through defense debuffs.
 

 

Emphasis mine, and I agree with you.  Or even put packs of spectrals which will debuff you to single digit to hit numbers when you are 10.

 

But it also demonstrates to me that the only real challenge for a well built character at or near 50 is defense debuffs or other such things (like auto-hit enervating field).  You probably could have gone AFK again many different enemy groups with the same outcome!

[Rudra]

59 minutes ago, nihilii said:

FWIW I actually tend to run super tight characters for accuracy, aiming for 95% tohit against +3s (given finalized builds are alphashifted) and no more.

 

Yet even when leveling, +4 death mages don't seem to pose much of a threat.

A simple event motivated me to (finally) post this. I went AFK entering a CoT tip mission. Came back 10 minutes later to see a +3/x8 ambush whacking on me, still at half life. This is silly. Level 30 CoT (or whichever level range gets the quicksand guys) upscaled to level 50 would have destroyed this character through defense debuffs.

Fundamentally, I don't see the logic in arguing level 50 CoT should be weaker than level 20 CoT. Not quoting you specifically here Yomo, not even subquoting anyone else, I just don't see the logic either from a game design rationale or from an ingame universe rationale.

What powers, enhancements, and set bonuses did you have that you didn't at level 30? How is you character built to withstand the various factions and their abilities? How you develop your characters through the levels determines how well that character can deal with unexpected developments from the different factions. There are character builds that struggle with some factions at one level range, and then yawn their way through other level ranges. There are characters that yawn their way through some factions at a lower level and then get destroyed by them at higher levels. It all boils down to how you build your character compared to what those factions are capable of at those times.

 

Edit: Example: I have characters that at level 20+ struggle with Council and Freakshow. At level 30+? Not a problem. Did the factions get weaker? No, I further developed my characters to the point they stopped being the threats they were at lower levels. And that is with the Freakshow and Council getting added mob types to deal with that.

Edited February 24, 2023 by Rudra

[nihilii]

21 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

But it also demonstrates to me that the only real challenge for a well built character at or near 50 is defense debuffs or other such things (like auto-hit enervating field).  You probably could have gone AFK again many different enemy groups with the same outcome!

I think many enemy groups have some level of defense debuffs (i.e. even lolCouncil has machine guns), highlevel CoT is fairly unique in having nothing. But your main point resonates, of course. Defense debuffs truly are the ace in the hole...

This makes for an even more brutal contrast within CoT, as their earlier units have access to some of the most potent defense debuffs ingame: location-based, autohit, coupled with slows. Nasty stuff! To go from that to nothing at all makes quite the difference.

[Mr. Vee]

1 hour ago, nihilii said:

This makes for an even more brutal contrast within CoT, as their earlier units have access to some of the most potent defense debuffs ingame: location-based, autohit, coupled with slows. Nasty stuff! To go from that to nothing at all makes quite the difference.

 

I'm definitely with you on the weirdness of the contrast in strength levels. I just don't mind continuing to live with the quirkiness of it, especially given how widespread they are. Just think about how many TFs and arcs would be altered if they were buffed. Imagine the squishie corpses trying to kill vines on a pug MLTF or the added misery to whichever of the shard TFs has all the circle. 

And maybe the low level ones are all the security and muscle the high level ones summoned and we finally worked our way up to the suits 😄

[Captain Fabulous]

2 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

 

Emphasis mine, and I agree with you.  Or even put packs of spectrals which will debuff you to single digit to hit numbers when you are 10.

 

But it also demonstrates to me that the only real challenge for a well built character at or near 50 is defense debuffs or other such things (like auto-hit enervating field).  You probably could have gone AFK again many different enemy groups with the same outcome!

I think people forget the baseline for this game is even level SOs. Even a tank at level 50, with just SOs, is not going to be able to withstand that kind of assault. People forget just how squishy most characters really are without the IO sets and globals.

I am a well-seasoned player, been playing since beta. I have characters of all levels, the vast majority with just common IOs, and even those in the 40-50 range can't easily solo higher than +1/3 or +2/2. And I'm highly-skilled. Imagine what it's like for a new player. The current power divide is HUGE.

[Lazarillo]

My thoughts from a while back, just thinking you could make them a little more engaging to fight, as well as more diverse, just by uncapping the levels of certain mobs.  I specifically mentioned the Thorn Casters, but this could probably apply to the boss-tier Madness/Ruin/Agony Mages, too.

 

Edited February 26, 2023 by Lazarillo