New Dawn's Paragon AT is pretty sweet!

[ZacKing]

24 minutes ago, nzer said:

I also just don't find "it's already broken, therefore it's fine if we break it more" to be a terribly compelling argument. Maybe we could unbreak things instead?

 

That's not at all what I said.  I didn't say we should add this into the game here.  Please don't put words in my mouth. 

 

I was only saying that IOs and Incarnates overpower players in a game that wasn't designed for it.  The game got shut down before content could get added that was designed for and balanced around higher end IO builds and Incarnates.  You've got some of that here now with hard mode TFs and such.  Even those are being speed run farmed already.  

 

25 minutes ago, nzer said:

Just to be clear, MLTF, the current form of the Hami raid, and IOs were all added in issue 9.

 

These used to be considered challenging content.  They're not anymore, and that's largely because of IOs and Incarnates.

[nzer]

13 minutes ago, ZacKing said:

That's not at all what I said.  I didn't say we should add this into the game here.  Please don't put words in my mouth. 

 

I was only saying that IOs and Incarnates overpower players in a game that wasn't designed for it.

 

You said this in response to me saying I don't think this AT should be added because it would be overpowered, so I don't know how else you expected me to interpret it. I know you personally are not saying the AT should be added here, but that's what I'm talking about, and you're responding to me.

 

34 minutes ago, ZacKing said:

These used to be considered challenging content.  They're not anymore, and that's largely because of IOs and Incarnates.

 

More because of incarnates than IOs, surely, given they were added at the exact same time as IOs.

[Doomguide2005]

1 hour ago, nzer said:

 

You said this in response to me saying I don't think this AT should be added because it would be overpowered, so I don't know how else you expected me to interpret it. I know you personally are not saying the AT should be added here, but that's what I'm talking about, and you're responding to me.

 

 

More because of incarnates than IOs, surely, given they were added at the exact same time as IOs.

I'd go a bit further.  Not IOs but set IOs and then piled on Incarnates to really shift balance out of whack.  I also think most of us are talking about sets when we say "IOs" not generic IOs which are definitely stronger than SOs but not nearly as "unbalacing".  To be clear I also think balance as a term mostly misses the mark.  A teeter-totter is always 'balanced' even if one end is hard against the ground vs ends level in the middle parallel to the ground.  This Paragon AT merely tips the balance point hard against the ground in the I Win end of the spectrum.  And basically I would rapidly find in boring as hell.   A bit like the first mission of Mender Ramiel's arc.  Interesting the first few times and then after herding up the map and defeating all the AVs with Neutrino Bolt alone on my Empath ... yawn.

[JasperStone]

5 hours ago, Excraft said:

I think most people would agree and are the same.  I'd probably give this a try just to do it but I think it would get boring after a while.  Would be fantastic for concept characters though.  I don't think it would destroy the game as some people here are suggesting.  Incarnates, IOs and such have already done that anyway.

I appreciate your perspective.

 

I have been working through all my alts doing precisely this.

...

2 years in, I'm not bored. 

 

 

 

[golstat2003]

I don’t think IOs and Incarnates are anyway  near as game breaking as some of the stuff that is possible with New Dawn’s Paragon AT. As far as I know no combination of IOs or Incarnates here in HC can get you to 70 defense to all positions and 4.65 perma recovery. LOL

 

EDIT: And I mean you have those values all the time, not just in short 90 second bursts with Destiny.

Edited January 30 by golstat2003

[Britannic]

I'm quite tickled by the idea of having a Kinetic Melee character with powers from the Kinetics set. But honestly I think something like this should be reserved for maybe the "Omega" slot power in Incarnates if it ever happens, that'd be balanced by it being only one selectable power at least. It'd also be further balanced by being limited to one enhancement slot, and that can only accept any additional crafted Alpha slot enhancements, as long as it's not the same Tier 4 version you've got currently in your Alpha slot since you can only have one of those. Obviously you'd need to see what the power requires to make that slotting choice.

Edited January 30 by Britannic

[Uncle Shags]

Sorry, this got long...

 

I think there's a schism within and among us.  We want and appreciate a challenge, but also want and appreciate success and excellence.

 

In this game, unfortunately, those two ideals can be in direct opposition.  Hard equals slow, but good equals fast. 

 

Here's an example.  0-50 can include lots of challenge, especially in a pug.  Deaths, wipes, pulling around corners, etc.  But shortly after 50 all that changes when your build comes together.  Steamroll hits and it becomes more about how many groups can we pull at once.  That was my expectation as I rolled into a pug Vanguard Shield RWZ mission - thinking my twinked out tank was invincible.  Long story short, for those who know this enemy, those expectations were dashed quickly with death and wipes. 

 

After discovering this new "hard mode" I resolved I was going to tackle it.  No one else did these missions in LFG, so I would!  Well, that didn't happen.  People like success, and success is fast.  Fast arrest -> fast xp -> you're awesome -> next mission please!

 

Do we want hard?  Yes.  I think?  But definitely not at the expense of success, which I think we've been conditioned to equate with speed and steamroll.

 

As it relates to this topic, we're torn between "Wow that build would allow the ultimate steamroll!" and "Yeah but then there's no challenge".

 

So maybe this debate is at least partially a result of game design issues.  Is there enough slow and hard content?  Is it fun?  Can we make slow and hard more rewarding and feel like success? 

 

From my example, is it as simple as making those Vanguard Shield missions give more xp?  And/or, is it about overcoming the AE farm stigma in order to tap into our already bubbling creativity to make AE "hard yet rewarding and fun" content more prominent for the average pug?

 

I personally would like to make a poison/kin/wormhole/SS tank.  But would that work out in the long run with the current content? 

Edited January 30 by Uncle Shags
P.S. I'd like Inferno on my tank too, please.

[Seed22]

4 hours ago, Uncle Shags said:

Do we want hard?  Yes.  I think?  But definitely not at the expense of success, which I think we've been conditioned to equate with speed and steamroll.

I would agree with this mostly.

 

The people who keep crying about “muh challung!!1” either quit 4* when the going gets a little rough or haven’t even touched HM 4. While that’s not super challenging content, for CoH it’s the hardest content in the game.

 

So there’s your challenge in relation to CoH at least. So it leads me to believe that no, people don’t want to play challenging content in CoH. The one’s crying want a facsimile of challenge to thump their chest at while overcoming no real adversity or chance of failure.

 

I’ve seen this personally. The second a 4* stalls for any reason for any amount of time, there was always one then multiple on my runs dipping. This was when 4* was new. It’s probably worse now if a 4* run encounters a hiccup.

 

 

People seem to want “challenge” that doesn’t noticeably impact clear speed or even present a chance of failure here. Which is insulting to the concept of what a challenge actually is, but whatever, it’s their rodeo 🤷🏾‍♂️

Edited January 30 by Seed22

[Captain Fabulous]

Everyone is focusing on some theoretical massively-OP build that's all T9s and every defense power in game and how evil and boring it would be, but not many are talking about the cool characters they could make that would be genuinely fun to play (y'know, the reason I started this thread).

Here are few concepts I'd like to explore:

• A melee staff fighter with nature powers who can summon animals to his aid.
• An elementalist with fire, ice, water, earth, air, and electricity powers.
• A weapons master with access to an entire arsenal of blades, blunt weapons, rifles, pistols, and gadgets.
• A paladin-like melee fighter with support powers.
• A mixed-range fighter with an Assault primary and armor secondary
• A Blaster with full mez protection (!!!)
• A regen-based character that doesn't suck 🤣

It's a game, it's supposed to be fun. If a godly build isn't fun for you then don't build one! Build something else that you will find fun!

 

[ShardWarrior]

I personally would love to see this implemented as part of the character creation in AE.  You could make some exceptionally challenging AVs with this kind of system.  I think it would be fun to create really epic Archvillains to fight.

[Aracknight]

I mean, if at x level i could choose a primary or secondary tier 1 power from whatever setand at the next level choose a tier 2 power, etc, that might be ok.  Could mix up a nice batch of ranged and melee powers without "needing" an epic set.  That could be fun.

 

But no, 9 tier 9 powers would be insane

[lemming]

43 minutes ago, ShardWarrior said:

I personally would love to see this implemented as part of the character creation in AE.  You could make some exceptionally challenging AVs with this kind of system.  I think it would be fun to create really epic Archvillains to fight.

You can do some interesting combos if you edit the files directly.   I've made a couple very tough AVs as helper bots. Still some limitations, and of course, they're not worth XP as foes.

[nzer]

4 hours ago, Seed22 said:

People seem to want “challenge” that doesn’t noticeably impact clear speed or even present a chance of failure here. Which is insulting to the concept of what a challenge actually is, but whatever, it’s their rodeo 🤷🏾‍♂️

 

Pretending a few instances of bad behavior you've seen in pugs is an accurate reflection of any of the people posting here in this topic is way more insulting.

 

5 hours ago, Uncle Shags said:

As it relates to this topic, we're torn between "Wow that build would allow the ultimate steamroll!" and "Yeah but then there's no challenge".

 

That isn't how this topic reads to me, I don't see anyone clamoring for this new AT so they can make more powerful characters. The split is between "you could make some cool character concepts with this" and "that's extremely unbalanced."

[Captain Fabulous]

1 hour ago, Aracknight said:

But no, 9 tier 9 powers would be insane

It wouldn't even be practical. Unlocking a powerset requires one power slot, which gives you the T1 and T2 powers if a primary set and the T1 power if a secondary set. To get nine T9 powers would require 18 power slots. Doesn't leave you much for anything else since we only get 24 slots.

I built a comfortably-powerful mostly-melee character with Foot Stomp, Shield Charge, and one T9 and honestly it works pretty well. More AoEs would be overkill, and would come at the expense of more useful powers.

[Uncle Shags]

58 minutes ago, nzer said:

 

6 hours ago, Uncle Shags said:

As it relates to this topic, we're torn between "Wow that build would allow the ultimate steamroll!" and "Yeah but then there's no challenge".

 

That isn't how this topic reads to me, I don't see anyone clamoring for this new AT so they can make more powerful characters. The split is between "you could make some cool character concepts with this" and "that's extremely unbalanced."

Sure.  You're right.  Character concept is a driving force.  Maybe it's an attempt to match an already created character, or maybe a completely unique creation.  That's great.  But for some a major part of the character concept is min/maxed efficiency and effectiveness.  That's great too.

[Apogee]

3 hours ago, Aracknight said:

I mean, if at x level i could choose a primary or secondary tier 1 power from whatever setand at the next level choose a tier 2 power, etc, that might be ok.  Could mix up a nice batch of ranged and melee powers without "needing" an epic set.  That could be fun.

 

But no, 9 tier 9 powers would be insane

 

A lot of the time I don't even bother taking tier 9 powers. I'm looking at you Unstoppable/Elude/Granite

[Aracknight]

11 minutes ago, Apogee said:

 

A lot of the time I don't even bother taking tier 9 powers. I'm looking at you Unstoppable/Elude/Granite

Ps when i said 9 tier 9 powers would be insane, i meant in the bad, "this should not be "way.  I feel like language betrayed me on this one.

 

Sorry for any confusion.

Edited January 30 by Aracknight

[Jiro Ito]

3 hours ago, ShardWarrior said:

I personally would love to see this implemented as part of the character creation in AE.  You could make some exceptionally challenging AVs with this kind of system.  I think it would be fun to create really epic Archvillains to fight.

 

Just wanted to throw out that you can, in fact, create any combination of primary and secondary powersets for any rank of npc in AE.  I have a species in one arc that is based on melee primaries and buffing secondaries (another server has a "guardian" AT like this, if I remember correctly).  You can also edit the data files to further customize your AE characters if you like.  I do this on most of my named bosses to give them more flavor, though that disables the experience earned on those characters, if that is important to you.

 

 

As for the OP, as many others have said, there's not a place for this on Homecoming as it would completely imbalance the game as it is.  I'm not saying it wouldn't be hella fun to drop Tar Patch and Whirlpool, then Freezing Rain, Blizzard, Rain of Fire, Ice Storm, Storm Cell, Hurricane, then Fold Space for days, but it's out of scope for what the HC team has stated as their mission statement.  It sounds like there's already a solution for people who want this.

 

[ShardWarrior]

1 hour ago, Jiro Ito said:

Just wanted to throw out that you can, in fact, create any combination of primary and secondary powersets for any rank of npc in AE.  I have a species in one arc that is based on melee primaries and buffing secondaries (another server has a "guardian" AT like this, if I remember correctly).  You can also edit the data files to further customize your AE characters if you like.  I do this on most of my named bosses to give them more flavor, though that disables the experience earned on those characters, if that is important to you.

 

I already knew this, but thank you.  The custom character creator in AE does not work quite the same as the character creator for the Paragon AT.  You can only pick one primary set and one secondary set and cannot mix and match from different primaries and different secondaries.  As you mentioned, editing the data files disables XP on those characters, and it also is not very user friendly to do in my opinion. 

[ZacKing]

On 1/29/2025 at 2:21 PM, nzer said:

You said this in response to me saying I don't think this AT should be added because it would be overpowered, so I don't know how else you expected me to interpret it. I know you personally are not saying the AT should be added here, but that's what I'm talking about, and you're responding to me.

 

My objection was to the assertion that this would somehow destroy the game with overpowered characters.  My point and my disagreement was that I don't that would be the case and that IOs and Incarnates have already created nigh unkillable characters. 

[arcane]

On 1/30/2025 at 9:05 AM, Seed22 said:

I would agree with this mostly.

 

The people who keep crying about “muh challung!!1” either quit 4* when the going gets a little rough or haven’t even touched HM 4. While that’s not super challenging content, for CoH it’s the hardest content in the game.

 

So there’s your challenge in relation to CoH at least. So it leads me to believe that no, people don’t want to play challenging content in CoH. The one’s crying want a facsimile of challenge to thump their chest at while overcoming no real adversity or chance of failure.

 

I’ve seen this personally. The second a 4* stalls for any reason for any amount of time, there was always one then multiple on my runs dipping. This was when 4* was new. It’s probably worse now if a 4* run encounters a hiccup.

 

 

People seem to want “challenge” that doesn’t noticeably impact clear speed or even present a chance of failure here. Which is insulting to the concept of what a challenge actually is, but whatever, it’s their rodeo 🤷🏾‍♂️

I could easily think up a CoH challenge *you* would be averse to even trying, FWIW. So the constant grandstanding about game difficulty is just plain tiresome.

[tidge]

19 hours ago, Uncle Shags said:

 Character concept is a driving force.  Maybe it's an attempt to match an already created character, or maybe a completely unique creation.  That's great.  But for some a major part of the character concept is min/maxed efficiency and effectiveness.  That's great too.

 

This is pretty much my approach to characters: come up with a concept, pick an AT/primary/secondary that fits the bill, and then try to make it really good at the concept. The CoX (HC) framework means that I can't get *everything*, but I'm also not being driven by min-max thinking out-of-the-box.

 

Other players have a different approach... and that's good for them! I still see quite a few players post build-after-build that are tied to an IMO old-school thinking about "spend two pools and four power picks for Hasten/Kick/Tough/Weave"... that works for those players, but not for me... usually neither in terms of concept nor play-fun. I have taken the Speed pool for when more than one power fits the concept, and the Fighting Synergy can be a lot of fun! Otherwise taking those powers feels to me a lot like "yep, just min-maxing."

 

 

[roleki]

2 hours ago, ZacKing said:

 

My objection was to the assertion that this would somehow destroy the game with overpowered characters.  My point and my disagreement was that I don't that would be the case and that IOs and Incarnates have already created nigh unkillable characters. 

Bullshit, my characters die ALL the time

[nzer]

2 hours ago, ZacKing said:

My objection was to the assertion that this would somehow destroy the game with overpowered characters.  My point and my disagreement was that I don't that would be the case and that IOs and Incarnates have already created nigh unkillable characters. 

 

Yes, to which I responded that something already being broken doesn't make it okay to break it further. IOs and incarnates already shift the game's difficulty balance away from where it arguably should be, which is a bad thing, and adding this new AT would make that problem even worse. And IOs and incarnates are tempered in ways this new AT wouldn't be (they require significant buy-in that any random character isn't likely to have, whereas anyone can just create a character of this new AT), and IOs at least have positives this new AT wouldn't (they enable deep buildcrafting and a player economy).

 

I'm not really understanding what your problem is with that logic.

[Octogoat]

So many people ultra serious about a game where we run around in our long John's beating the crap out of other people in their long johns