Steel Canyon fires: a few questions

[Techwright]

Steel Canyon fires: a few questions

 

1.)  What, if anything, can externally affect the performance of the extinguisher backpack?  For example, can yellow inspirations reduce the number of misses, or can Hasten speed the interval between spray actions?  Anything else that might affect it?

 

2.) What's probably the best way to solo a fire site, start to finish?  Rotate between gangs and fires, or try to eliminate all gangs (to prevent re-ignition of fires) then hopefully have enough time for all the fires? Perhaps another tactic?  I ask this because it appears that at some fires I've been able to eliminate all the gangs, and at others, they appear to keep on coming until the end.

 

3.) What speeds up/slows down the timer until the fatal blast?  Does elimination of all the gangs effect this?  Do the number of fires do this?  I've notice the warning blast goes off at different times, and there seems to be different lengths between it and the final blast, which leads me to believe there are effects on the timer.

 

 

 

[BraveDecoy]

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Hellion_Arson

 

Basically, the extinguisher packs act like any other temp power, so inspirations and such don't really work. 

The fires are also weak to any Ice or Cold attacks you may have. 

 

Start with the fires first, once you clear enough you can get the larger pack from the Fire Chief.  Don't worry too much about the Hellions, but if you've got a good AoE attack feel free to disperse them from time to time.    You're not going to get all the badges in one event.

 

It's also a zone event, so it's designed to be handled by a group.  Focus down one fire at a time, maybe have someone on Hellion duty. 

[aethereal]

Yellow insps will indeed improve your accuracy (so will global accuracy bonuses, tactics, the kismet to-hit unique, etc.

 

Global recharge (including Hasten) should improve the recharge time of the temp power.

 

What you can't improve on the temp power is its damage: red insps etc won't affect it.

[Ukase]

Just anecdotally, I know that if you ignore the Hellions starting the fires, and you're the only one putting them out, things can go badly, and the building explodes with something crazy like 10k worth of damage. Or is it 100K? It's more hitpoints than my characters have, I know that much. 

Your strategy has to change if there are other folks putting out fires or worse, killing the Hellion fire starters. When they kill them all - you have no more fires to put out. Where's the fun in that? So, if you have any control over it, the only time to waste the Hellions are when the fires are growing faster than you can put the fires out. Using the temp, it might be good to put out 4-5 fires, waste a few Hellions, put out another fire or two. Just depends on how much fire there is when you get there, and how fast you can put out the fires. 

[Ulysses Dare]

On 8/12/2025 at 9:09 AM, Ukase said:

Just anecdotally, I know that if you ignore the Hellions starting the fires, and you're the only one putting them out, things can go badly, and the building explodes with something crazy like 10k worth of damage. Or is it 100K? It's more hitpoints than my characters have, I know that much. 

Exploding buildings put out enough damage to one-shot Kronos: 

 

[Techwright]

6 hours ago, Ulysses Dare said:

Exploding buildings put out enough damage to one-shot Kronos: 

 

 

Yowsers! 😱

 

On 8/12/2025 at 10:09 AM, Ukase said:

Just anecdotally, I know that if you ignore the Hellions starting the fires, and you're the only one putting them out, things can go badly, and the building explodes with something crazy like 10k worth of damage. Or is it 100K? It's more hitpoints than my characters have, I know that much.  

 

Probably depends on the character's resistance, but in that vid that Ulysses Dare posted, some of them got hit for -255788!    I don't know if that was just a number after player resistence, or if the game threw up its hands and said "Why waste my effort counting higher?  You dead, dog."

 

On 8/11/2025 at 8:26 PM, BraveDecoy said:

It's also a zone event, so it's designed to be handled by a group.  Focus down one fire at a time, maybe have someone on Hellion duty. 

 

Right, but as stated in the OP, there are often times when others cannot be bothered to participate.  On those occasions it becomes solo.

 

 

I thank all for the feedback so far.  Perhaps I'm mistaken, but it sounds like some of the comments are not taking into account that Hellions reinvigorate fires that you've started to put out.  Even a single Hellion can completely undo your efforts with a single toss of the flaming cocktail.  So focusing on a fire and ignoring the Hellions around can often be a futile time waster.

 

 

Edited yesterday at 09:11 PM by Techwright

[kanga]

13 hours ago, Ulysses Dare said:

Exploding buildings put out enough damage to one-shot Kronos: 

 

That is nuts! lol

[MoonSheep]

i think -res powers cast onto the fire increases the output of the fire extinguishers. would need to confirm, it has been a while since i’ve done it

[Oubliette_Red]

On 8/13/2025 at 9:53 AM, Ulysses Dare said:

Exploding buildings put out enough damage to one-shot Kronos: 

 

 

Thank you for posting that, been looking for that video for a couple of years now. Pretty sure I have is saved on my desktop but it's still in a box from our last move.

 

And that's still not the most amount of one-shot damage you can take in the game.

Edited 3 hours ago by Oubliette_Red