Least played ATs/powerset combos

[Nostromo21]

I wonder what the least played AT and primary/secondary combos would likely be...? I imagine every single combo of powersets on every AT has been played, but I'm sure there must be a lowest number that have been levelled to 50, whether due to being very weak, just a bad combo (too much crossover/redundancy, no synergy, painful gameplay, super-weak spots, etc). I couldn't even hazard a guess, as I just don't have enough play time and only 62 toons and counting, due to my rampant alt-o-holism, but I'm sure some of you vets and experts will have some idea! ;)

[Uun]

The devs posted stats a while back, but they haven't been updated since then. It has numbers for every possible combination.

 

 

[Nostromo21]

Cheers, but that's total server characters - did it have AT/primary/secondary breakdowns, do you remember by any chance...?
---

Nm - found it! It's way back in 2020 so hopefully they update it soon with the new influx of players.

 

No surprise - Arachnos and Kheldians are bottom of the list, with Widows right at the bottom.

And my Dark/Ninja blaster is almost the least played blaster combo heh. Which boggles as it's so much damn fun, to solo anyway.

Edited March 16 by Nostromo21

[Riverdusk]

7 minutes ago, Nostromo21 said:

Cheers, but that's total server characters - did it have AT/primary/secondary breakdowns, do you remember by any chance...?

 

It does, just scroll down, at least for each primary/secondary individually.  You can combine the least of each and be pretty safe.    For instance sonic/ninja was probably the least played blaster combo.  

 

As mentioned though, it is very old at this point, and some things have gotten buffed or gotten more or less popular since.

[Uun]

Scroll down and there's a section for each AT with a bar chart listing primaries and secondaries. Immediately below each bar chart, expand the "Reveal hidden contents" and it provides a list of every possible combination for that AT ranked by popularity. For example, the least popular blaster combo was AR/Elec.

 

[TinyJuggs]

Nice to know my ice/rad stalker is not popular. 

[Doomguide2005]

Wonder how many Fire/Sonic Controllers there are now.  Only 12 back then.  Only Ice and Darkness appeared further down the ***/Sonic pairing lists as a choice.  Mine is currently 39th lvl on Excelsior.

[purexedz]

Sonic Resonance/Archery Defender has to be one of least played combos

[Duckbutler]

I really want to like both of those sets and they do not like me back. At this point I've decided the breakup is mutual and it's time to move on.

[Braddack]

i realy wonder if anyone beside me plays an Ice / Fire  Stalker 😄

[Troo]

59 minutes ago, Braddack said:

i realy wonder if anyone beside me plays an Ice / Fire  Stalker 😄

 

nope

 

lol

[Lusiphur Malache]

I made several characters from that list because they weren't popular.  A km/regen scrapper, was no fun before I flipped my attack chain and started with those long animation heavy hitting powers.

Dark/Poison controller, first controller and it was quite a slog because of my inexperience.  Don't know how many teammates told me not to use my rez on them.

Got both a uniform peacebringer and warshade, so don't let anyone tell you it can't be done.

[StrikerFox]

Article on massivelyop, published a few days ago. It doesn't reveal the powerset combos but gives how active each AT has been in the past 90 days:

https://massivelyop.com/2024/03/07/over-42000-people-played-city-of-heroes-homecoming-in-the-last-month/

 

[Thraxen]

No way that’s accurate. More mms than scraps and corruptors?  

[ZorkNemesis]

23 minutes ago, Thraxen said:

No way that’s accurate. More mms than scraps and corruptors?  

Mastermind is a fairly unique archetype you don't see in very many MMOs these days.  Very few active games offer dedicated pet classes, the few that do usually have the pet as more support while the player is still doing the lifting.  And even then, how many give you as many pets as CoX does?  It might stand out because on one hand you have your generic melee DPS, but on the other hand you have an army of ninjas!

[Riverdusk]

30 minutes ago, Thraxen said:

No way that’s accurate. More mms than scraps and corruptors?  

 

Key is probably that is just "active AT's"  A list of how many active level 50's would most likely be very different and I think more what was used as a judge of the stats in the past.  From what I remember hearing, MM's are one of those AT's that is often started, but also more often abandoned before making it to level 50.

 

Edit: Just looked back at the old stats and that kind of confirms it.  On "all levels" MM came in #3 most popular.  When looking at level 50's, MM's drop down to #8.

Edited March 10 by Riverdusk

[Hardboiled Hero]

I definitely believe there are more MM's actively played than scraps and corruptors.  From what I've seen, MM's are way more common in radio/paper teams and many people love soloing with the AT as well.  I don't see many blasters, but Imagine there are a lot doing AE and High-end content.

 

  When I first saw the list, The AT that really stuck out was Defender.  There's really no way Defender should be less popular than corruptor.. as in, Defender is just mechanically superior in every way (unless something has changed since last looking into it 3 years ago) and you can make all the same concepts with them, at least if you can get past the idea of hero/villain AT's.  That said, as often as I complain about support sets being useless in the current incarnation of the game, I guess many people agree with me.

[Ringo]

Corruptor primaries out-damage Defender secondaries when on teams.  While Defenders will provide stronger buffs/debuffs, some times you just want to see those bigger orange numbers

[nihilii]

On 1/20/2024 at 1:59 AM, Nostromo21 said:

No surprise - Arachnos and Kheldians are bottom of the list, with Windows right at the bottom.

 

I feel this particular number can be thought of another way: a Peacebringer contains 1 powerset combo. A Defender contains 224 powerset combos (16 primaries * 14 secondaries). In a naive way you'd expect to see 224 Defenders for every Peacebringer, based purely on diversity.

No doubt epic ATs get a (large!) premium due to their classification as a distinct AT. But, in terms of powersets, it can get interesting:

- 1146 scrappers used Titan Weapons, at a time where TW was arguably the most overpowered primary.
- meanwhile, "Luminous Blast / Luminous Aura" was played by 1397 Peacebringers (obviously).

So you had more peacebringers than the Flavor of the Month/Year melee build, for example.

[Marshal_General]

I think the SoAs would get a boost if they could figure a way to let you start at level 1 in your build instead of making you wait until the level 24 respect.

[ZemX]

On 3/10/2024 at 1:39 PM, StrikerFox said:

Article on massivelyop, published a few days ago. It doesn't reveal the powerset combos but gives how active each AT has been in the past 90 days:

https://massivelyop.com/2024/03/07/over-42000-people-played-city-of-heroes-homecoming-in-the-last-month/

 

Interestingly, these numbers aren't a whole lot different from the 2020 data here on the forums.  Notably, Tankers are a lot more popular, but I think the 2020 data didn't reflect the buff they got yet, so that makes sense.  Otherwise, tracks pretty well the list of active ATs (excluding Brute Fiery Aura) from before.

 

The powersets would be a lot more interesting because they've changed more than the ATs themselves since then.

[Riverdusk]

 

 

20 hours ago, Hardboiled Hero said:

  When I first saw the list, The AT that really stuck out was Defender.  There's really no way Defender should be less popular than corruptor.. as in, Defender is just mechanically superior in every way (unless something has changed since last looking into it 3 years ago) and you can make all the same concepts with them, at least if you can get past the idea of hero/villain AT's.  That said, as often as I complain about support sets being useless in the current incarnation of the game, I guess many people agree with me.

 

"Mechanically superior in every way" is definitely flat out untrue.  Perfect and most obvious big mechanical advantage corruptors have is a higher damage cap.  Especially plays into if you decide to go with kinetics.

 

They also tend to wipe out AV's (and even bosses) faster as that's when scourge can really kick in and make a huge difference.

[Hardboiled Hero]

3 hours ago, Riverdusk said:

 

 

 

"Mechanically superior in every way" is definitely flat out untrue.  Perfect and most obvious big mechanical advantage corruptors have is a higher damage cap.  Especially plays into if you decide to go with kinetics.

 

They also tend to wipe out AV's (and even bosses) faster as that's when scourge can really kick in and make a huge difference.

 

  I'm not trying to dis corruptors and I'm not theory-crafting. (The numbers have already been crunched by people more competent in that field). The simple fact is, that Defender's damage is generally on par with corruptors, only defenders are better at mixing their support powers in due to their recovery bonus.  If people wanted to pick corruptors just for damage, it seems like they should have gone blaster instead.  Since people are choosing corruptor though, I can only assume they really want to play a damage/support hybrid, which is a role better filled by a Defender.  Either that, or they're looking at things more from the lore perspective, in which case "Mechanically better" doesn't actually matter so much.

 

  Granted, I myself feel that both AT's are pretty much useless in the end-game.. where you'd really care more about damage caps, because neither of them are the best ranged damage, and support doesn't seem to matter so much in end-game content.

[Riverdusk]

59 minutes ago, Hardboiled Hero said:

 

  I'm not trying to dis corruptors and I'm not theory-crafting. (The numbers have already been crunched by people more competent in that field). The simple fact is, that Defender's damage is generally on par with corruptors, only defenders are better at mixing their support powers in due to their recovery bonus.  If people wanted to pick corruptors just for damage, it seems like they should have gone blaster instead.  Since people are choosing corruptor though, I can only assume they really want to play a damage/support hybrid, which is a role better filled by a Defender.  Either that, or they're looking at things more from the lore perspective, in which case "Mechanically better" doesn't actually matter so much.

 

  Granted, I myself feel that both AT's are pretty much useless in the end-game.. where you'd really care more about damage caps, because neither of them are the best ranged damage, and support doesn't seem to matter so much in end-game content.

 

In most cases yes, I believe you are correct, but there are always exceptions, which was my point.  I can only assume the 'number crunching' you looked at was generalized.  There are definitely at least a few cases where corruptors clearly outdo defenders (like my examples given among others).   It depends on specific powersets and the situation.   

 

I also won't even get into that support is useless.  Not worth the bother.  😄   Let's just say I agree to disagree.

[Psiphon]

On 3/13/2024 at 12:55 AM, Hardboiled Hero said:

 

  I'm not trying to dis corruptors and I'm not theory-crafting. (The numbers have already been crunched by people more competent in that field). The simple fact is, that Defender's damage is generally on par with corruptors, only defenders are better at mixing their support powers in due to their recovery bonus.  If people wanted to pick corruptors just for damage, it seems like they should have gone blaster instead.  Since people are choosing corruptor though, I can only assume they really want to play a damage/support hybrid, which is a role better filled by a Defender.  Either that, or they're looking at things more from the lore perspective, in which case "Mechanically better" doesn't actually matter so much.

 

  Granted, I myself feel that both AT's are pretty much useless in the end-game.. where you'd really care more about damage caps, because neither of them are the best ranged damage, and support doesn't seem to matter so much in end-game content.

I'm not sure how Defenders can out  damage Corruptors, they've got lower base damage, lower damage caps and that's not even taking Scourge into account. 

Could you please explain this or point to the links that do? 

 

Damage aside, my alts tend to be vigilantes, as it fits best with my arrest philosophy. 😁 Making them as Defenders just seems wrong.