Focused Feedback New Powerset - Psionic Armor (Brutes, Scrappers, Sentinels, Stalkers, Tankers)

[StarkWhite]

2 minutes ago, arcane said:

3) We’re all in agreement that Aura of Insanity is the power to skip right? (I’m totally fine with that - picking 9 primary powers is painful)

I would instead say that if you want the best experience with AOI, you need to craft your whole build around it to get the most out of it. 

For me, that makes for a super fun variant that feels plenty strong at the difficulties I tend to play at.

Grim efficiency bores me. Someone with different priorities will have a different answer.

[BZRKR]

9 minutes ago, arcane said:

3) We’re all in agreement that Aura of Insanity is the power to skip right? (I’m totally fine with that - picking 9 primary powers is painful)

 

I made a Dark/Psi/Psi Brute with Fold Space. I slotted Aura of Insanity with 3 lvl 50 Acc/Mez HO's. On a +1x8 door mission vs Carnies, it was fun to fold enemies in, and then use the various PBAoE's. AoI was definitely disrupting the mob's attacks, and letting me grind through fairly comfortably. Now, obviously that's not tippy-top tier content, but was fun.

 

If the resist toggles get a little bump up, and Impose Presence gets verified, I think AoI is skippable for sure.

 

I think I'll make a Psi/Spines/? Tanker this weekend and see if a damage aura in the mix makes for a fun "tar pit" kind of character. 

[Parabola]

3 hours ago, Koopak said:

3 hours ago, Shin Magmus said:

Have they said why they wanted this one random power, with random effects, to be the exception to Mez Enhancements increase duration and instead have Mez Enhancements increase magnitude?  I'd just like to know why.

If i recall correctly, the same flag that makes a mez's duration ignore purple patch also makes the mez's magnitude now be effected by purple patch and by extension enhancements. That means either you make the mez not be effected by enhancements at all, and have a static mez that is reduced by purple patch, or you make it enhancable. Otherwise its duration is effected by purple patch and you don't get the clean switch over between mezes every 4 seconds.

Edit: This is how Cloak of Fear works as well.

Hang on. So these two powers react differently to enhancement than every other mez power in the game? I get not wanting to be constrained by precedent but is this not going to be just a tad confusing?!

[FaradayGauss]

I also think this set would be better off as Defense-based. Or at the very least, having some DDR in toggles/passives, adding Defense to Psychokinetic Barrier to go along with the Absorb, and/or having +Defense for each enemy hit by Memento Mori.

[Wavicle]

4 hours ago, Shin Magmus said:

Have they said why they wanted this one random power, with random effects, to be the exception to Mez Enhancements increase duration and instead have Mez Enhancements increase magnitude?  I'd just like to know why.

It’s not the only power like that. 

[Wavicle]

1 hour ago, arcane said:

 

 

3) We’re all in agreement that Aura of Insanity is the power to skip right? (I’m totally fine with that - picking 9 primary powers is painful)

No definitely not. Heavily slotted AoI becomes very good.

[BrandX]

As of current build, Mask Presence doesn't look to be losing Defense when one enters combat.

 

However, Aura of Insanity still WILL NOT take Scrapper ATOs (Scrapper's Strike and Critical Strikes)

[Kaballah]

8 hours ago, Wavicle said:

The debuff resistance stacks. If you fire off the power often enough you can have significantly higher debuff resistance.

 

That's neat, I hadn't noticed that but yeah I agree that's pretty great as it is. Thanks for the info!

[arcane]

22 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

No definitely not. Heavily slotted AoI becomes very good.

Effective at mezzing trash mobs or effective at damage and/or firing off procs? I don’t care about the former on a melee toon to be clear.

[Shin Magmus]

1 hour ago, Parabola said:

Hang on. So these two powers react differently to enhancement than every other mez power in the game? I get not wanting to be constrained by precedent but is this not going to be just a tad confusing?!

   Yes, they work differently to every other mez power in the game and also work in a way that is completely unexpected to the casual player.  Imagine if a Controller slotting some Hold enhancements into Char let them just Hold an EB consistently, every time, with only one click.  The fact that mez magnitudes are static is an important criteria to how mez powers are balanced between the ATs.  Frankly, any power working differently needs a HUGE disclaimer in the power info in-game, and probably even something on the tooltip as well, like: WARNING: This power's magnitude can be increased by slotting Mez Duration Enhancements.

 

   Observe Exhibit A: the literal verbiage used in-game to describe a Hold Duration Enhancement... which follows the same logic for other mezzes.

   THEY'RE ALWAYS EXPLICITLY REFERENCING DURATION EVERYWHERE WITHIN THE GAME.  This means that, to not be lying to the playerbase, HC Devs would need to perform a massive text sweep and change all of this text to say something else, such as "Hold Effectiveness" or more clearly "Hold Duration sometimes but Hold Magnitude when we feel like it."  You can't just make an exception that turns all of these lines of text into outright falsehoods, and lie to the players, without doing some work on the back-end to fix the descriptions and explain the truth.  Players shouldn't need to guess how their powers and enhancements might work, and need foresight pre-knowledge obtained from the forums or Discord.

[Wavicle]

27 minutes ago, arcane said:

Effective at mezzing trash mobs or effective at damage and/or firing off procs? I don’t care about the former on a melee toon to be clear.

Well that’s personal preference I guess. In my testing AoI offered a lot of mitigation.

[Shin Magmus]

See below for an example of how these exceptions should be clearly spelled out to avoid lying by omission: my edits in green.

 

 Aura of Insanity

• Toggle: PBAoE, Foe Confuse, Disorient, Sleep, Hold, Fear, DoT(Psionic), +Special, Mez Magnitude can be enhanced
• You emit a powerful psychic aura that causes the minds of those around you to become weak and distracted. Foes may be randomly stunned, held, terrified or even confused in your presence, in addition to suffering a debuff derived from the applied control effect.  Unlike most powers, enhancements can boost the magnitude of these control effects, enabling them to affect stronger foes.  Those that resist these effects will suffer damage over time. This power allows you to use your own Hit Points to keep enemies near you disabled. The power cost no endurance but can be dangerous to use.
• Fixed description typo.
• Tankers and Brutes should now be able to slot taunt enhancements and sets on this power.
• Tanker radius increased to 12ft.

[Arcadio]

32 minutes ago, arcane said:

Effective at mezzing trash mobs or effective at damage and/or firing off procs? I don’t care about the former on a melee toon to be clear.

When I was first testing a scrapper I had the purple confuse proc in it along with the confuse chance interface and I was somewhat regularly confusing bosses at +4.

[Koopak]

1 hour ago, Parabola said:

Hang on. So these two powers react differently to enhancement than every other mez power in the game? I get not wanting to be constrained by precedent but is this not going to be just a tad confusing?!

I mean sure it is a little and i think the set could do with a note in the description to clarify. I mainly dislike that the enhancement effects readout in the enhancement menu is unable to tell the difference, but that's a spaghetti code limitation. In the end its just gonna be a quirk people have to learn. The alternative is just not bothering with a power like this at all since there is no way to make this kind of power have meaningful value and not be busted OP when the magnitude is unchanging.

[Wavicle]

The description SHOULD say that enhancements raise magnitude, but there ARE other powers in the game that work like that (Acrobatics, for example).

[BrandX]

Have to say, I am enjoying the set.  Works for other concepts besides psychics, which is nice too.

 

Also, Impenetrable Mind, PLEASE give it a min FX option.  I'm not saying do this for every option, but this one would be nice to have it on.

[Koopak]

Alright finally sorted the damn hook issue that was causing my drivers to crash when recording. Here's some footage of what the current build is capable of. Yes i used Ageless Radial but only because carni -tohit is annoying and i didn't wanna respect into focused accuracy. You'll notice I don't even use my beloved Recovery Serum and do manage a little end crash along the way I think.
 

I'll see about doing some mobs in an ITF just to explore how rough -def, is, as that may encourage a different approach to my build. Some other notes not to let slide, while you'll only get one, maybe two bosses held depending on what Alpha you run and RNG on which mob counts are 'first' you have secondary options to temporarily push this even further. Control Hybrid doesn't work well because of how it behaves, but Support Hybrid gives a little bump, Clarion Radial is massive, as is Vanguard Medal/Megalomaniac Accolade. Granted none of that is perma, but thats some massive control for periods of time. Clarion or the Accolades basically just say "mez everything for 1 minute"

 

 

Edited Friday at 11:16 PM by Koopak

[Cheli]

On 5/28/2025 at 11:08 PM, rwmagpie said:

i'm not disagreeing with you here, just adding a thought that someone might find worth their read:

 

making powersets for people on everlasting (the unofficial roleplaying shard) is not going to appeal to people on excelsior (the unofficial not roleplaying shard); making ineffective sets for "theme" reasons rather than sets that have a clear, identifiable niche gives people reason to play it and consider it for certain powerset combinations. i was floating electric melee + psi armor until i actually looked at the numbers and realized i'd be better off on dark armor for control and survivability with mechanics very similar to psi armor's.

it's bleak!

Funny thing is, I play on Everlasting, the RP nerd server, and am an RP nerd. The thing is that RP nerds are creative and if we like a powerset, or want a character that is both thematic and mechanically effective, we can make it work for theme. I know people who've recolored Water Blast to be poison, blood, paint, recolored Time and Dark Armor to be sand, one of my fave characters of mine is Spines/FA and I RP the spines as shards of volcanic obsidian cos the character is the priestess of the Hawaiian volcano goddess. I even have a character who specifically would benefit from a psychic-themed armor set cos she's a melee psychic, but I'm just gonna keep her EnA if this set remains as mediocre as it is currently.

 

Even funnier, if there's a new set (or even an old set I haven't given a try to yet) that's mechanically effective and I don't have an RP concept for it, I'll usually be inspired to come up with one to fit that set just so I can give it a try.

 

Theme is never a good reason to make a mediocre set. 

[Dragotect]

This should have a negative hole (weakness to incredibly warped stuff, like eldrich horror stuff, abyss stuff that drives you insane if you mentally look into it too much), not lethal. Only resist should be psionic (that stacks with every toggle on to cap or close enough to it SOs will get you there, like Fire does to fire or Invuln does to physical/smash), and everything else defense with maybe one auto/toggle power that does res(all) to help fill the resist issue if they get through defenses. That's the theme I'd have in my mind of a psionic defense set.

I'll probably make one (since I theme all my toons and have wanted a psionic armor one), but feel like if this is designed for theme it missed the mark.

I'd say if any armor set is to have a lethal hole, it should be energy (think Dune shields). But as many have argued... a lethal hole is just bad as it feels like practically every lethal attack in the game is coupled with a -def.

Edited yesterday at 12:23 AM by Dragotect

[Koopak]

On the topic of theme ill just share my 2 cents like i did during closed. There are already several armor sets that make sense for a pure defense psionic armor. Super Reflexes and Energy Aura being the prime examples, with both being quiet vague in their descriptions, thus able to comfortably fit the usual arguments for why this set needs to be defense. More importantly none of what Psionic Armor does is abnormal for City of Heroes psionics. Sure in other settings psionics are limited to mind reading a precog or at most deflecting attacks, but in the setting of City of Heroes, psionics often do a lot more. A casual perusal of enemy psychics and their capabilities should be more than enough to justify the approaches taken here.

Which is all to say, that why a defense based version of this set is thematic, the resistance/regneration based version we have is equally thematic within the setting and helps to fill a gap that only Dark Armor realistically approached before it, and focusing on the unique elements of City of Heroes psychics.

On a practical side, the likely hood of a complete top to bottom rework this late in the set's development is pretty unlikely, especially given the set has some very positive feedback.

Edited yesterday at 12:29 AM by Koopak

[FupDup]

23 minutes ago, Koopak said:

On the topic of theme ill just share my 2 cents like i did during closed. There are already several armor sets that make sense for a pure defense psionic armor. Super Reflexes and Energy Aura being the prime examples, with both being quiet vague in their descriptions, thus able to comfortably fit the usual arguments for why this set needs to be defense. More importantly none of what Psionic Armor does is abnormal for City of Heroes psionics. Sure in other settings psionics are limited to mind reading a precog or at most deflecting attacks, but in the setting of City of Heroes, psionics often do a lot more. A casual perusal of enemy psychics and their capabilities should be more than enough to justify the approaches taken here.

Which is all to say, that why a defense based version of this set is thematic, the resistance/regneration based version we have is equally thematic within the setting and helps to fill a gap that only Dark Armor realistically approached before it, and focusing on the unique elements of City of Heroes psychics.

On a practical side, the likely hood of a complete top to bottom rework this late in the set's development is pretty unlikely, especially given the set has some very positive feedback.

SR has a lack of Psi resists and typed Psi defense, so using it to cosplay as a psychic is a bit flawed (one of the main points of having an "elemental" armor is to counter its own element, like almost all of the elemental armors do). Energy Aura is closer, but it only has good Psi protection during Overload. Oddly enough, Ninjutsu can actually stack fairly high Psi resists (using the clicky mezz protection power) while having positional defenses, so that one would make more sense as a "We have defensive Psi armor at home" cosplay (it even comes with a confuse power too). Or I guess just play a Widow, which is nearly perfect for the Psi fantasy but has limited attack sets to go with it (only choices are Claws and Psi Blast). 

 

On the resistances side, Elec armor post-buffs probably does a better job at the res/regen blend while having fairly good Psi resists (just color it purple/pink and call it psychic lightning). It even (post buff) has a smaller Toxic hole than Psi does, which is funny. 

 

I think Psi Armor is just in a pretty weird spot right now, being more or less a reskinned Dark Armor trying to be Regeneration. For other "theme" based sets like Seismic Blast and Storm Blast, they have numeric stat tuning issues but they do at least feel close to what they're trying to represent. Psi Armor is just...strange. 

Edited yesterday at 12:51 AM by FupDup

[BrandX]

38 minutes ago, Dragotect said:

This should have a negative hole (weakness to incredibly warped stuff, like eldrich horror stuff, abyss stuff that drives you insane if you mentally look into it too much), not lethal. Only resist should be psionic (that stacks with every toggle on to cap or close enough to it SOs will get you there, like Fire does to fire or Invuln does to physical/smash), and everything else defense with maybe one auto/toggle power that does res(all) to help fill the resist issue if they get through defenses. That's the theme I'd have in my mind of a psionic defense set.

I'll probably make one (since I theme all my toons and have wanted a psionic armor one), but feel like if this is designed for theme it missed the mark.

I'd say if any armor set is to have a lethal hole, it should be energy (think Dune shields). But as many have argued... a lethal hole is just bad as it feels like practically every lethal attack in the game is coupled with a -def.

 

I was at 65% for Lethal Resist on a Scrapper, yes, it's not capped (and I could likely do a better build), but I wouldn't call that to much of a hole compared to other sets.

 

I feel the Toxic hole is what will hurt more.

[BrandX]

8 minutes ago, FupDup said:

SR has a lack of Psi resists and typed Psi defense, so using it to cosplay as a psychic is a bit flawed (one of the main points of having an "elemental" armor is to counter its own element, like almost all of the elemental armors do). Energy Aura is closer, but it only has good Psi protection during Overload. Oddly enough, Ninjutsu can actually stack fairly high Psi resists (using the clicky mezz protection power) while having positional defenses, so that one would make more sense as a "We have defensive Psi armor at home" cosplay (it even comes with a confuse power too). Or I guess just play a Widow, which is nearly perfect for the Psi fantasy but has limited attack sets to go with it (only choices are Claws and Psi Blast). 

 

On the resistances side, Elec armor post-buffs probably does a better job at the res/regen blend while having very good Psi resists (just color it purple/pink and call it psychic lightning). It even (post buff) has a smaller Toxic hole than Psi does, which is funny. 

 

I think Psi Armor is just in a pretty weird spot right now, being more or less a reskinned Dark Armor trying to be Regeneration. For other "theme" based sets like Seismic Blast and Storm Blast, they have numeric stat tuning issues but they do at least feel close to what they're trying to represent. Psi Armor is just...strange. 

 

You also have Willpower if you want to go that route.

[Kaballah]

4 hours ago, Wavicle said:

No definitely not. Heavily slotted AoI becomes very good.

yeah I can not imagine skipping Aura of Insanity, it's the signature power of the set. everything else is just un-flashy "make me less likely to die" - not that any of that is bad, it's just all really basic numerical stuff without a big blatant effect on enemy behavior.

e: it interacts in very nifty ways with Cognitive Interface and Control Hybrid, it's going to be a really interesting armor set late game 🤷‍♀️

Edited yesterday at 01:03 AM by Kaballah

[Psi-bolt]

So I've played with the set on a Scrapper and it's very, very mid.   It's fine.  I intend to level one of these because the set looks very nice, but I don't see myself playing it long term.  It seems to take a heavy investment to get to the same place as other sets.   My concerns with the set are:

 

1. First, the lowered lethal resists just seem to be random and don't make any sense.  I know you want there to be some differences but this is just a weakness for there to be a weakness.  You can build it out of existence, but that limits the set in ways that don't seem justified.
2. Devour Psyche being a cone is again, fine, but if you're looking to make a distinction between Tankers/Brutes and Scrappers/Stalkers why not make it a ST that scales off the rank of the NPCs.  So it's more effective if used against AVs, and proportionally lower against Bosses, Lts. and minions.  The adaptive recharge could go or be based on the rank as well.
3. It feels like a heavy end set but that's more because I really feel the need to take Tough/Weave to get the resists and defenses in a good place. 

Edited 14 hours ago by Psi-bolt
Just some edits to make the point more clear.