A relook at support powers

[MonteCarla]

9 hours ago, Snarky said:

yeah, what i want is a toon with a bunch of powers, maybe all, that are completely useless to me.  

 

I am seriously glad dark miasma for Corr is not that way.  so many Corr secondaries are team bitch powers.  A villain, and you end up being the waterboy?  F that.

So... buffing other players is somehow... emasculating? 😄

[MsSmart]

14 hours ago, Kai Moon said:

On one hand, basically all other MMOs let support characters buff themselves.

On the other hand, basically all other MMOs have buffs like "Increase Stamina by 5%" or "Reduce damage taken by 10% (for 20 seconds on a 120 second cooldown)" or shield/overcap HP that's more mechanically similar to healing than buffing.

I can't say for sure CoH having actually good buffs is the tradeoff we get for not buffing ourselves. But it might be the tradeoff.

I feel if the buffs and abilities are made into PBAOEs, then support can buff themselves, but the other classes also gets the buff as well and they are the much better for it and do not become inferiors as a poster above noted. There are some buffs that are already area like the forcefield ones as mentioned above, would be nice for other abilities for other support classes to have that benefit, the recipients would just be as grateful for a PBAOE buff as a personal (target) buff. Also a PBAOE given to say O2 would get all the players at a time and heal them as opposed to the defender doing one at a time in a spammed status effect battle... There are team efficiencies in a PBAOE over a single target effect, the world is not perfect for the PBAOE area of effects is likely not as ranged as a targeted one, so there is no perfect solution which requires adjusting play style to maximize your ability.

[MsSmart]

I do want to thank  you all for posting and providing reasons for your position

[Snarky]

52 minutes ago, MonteCarla said:

So... buffing other players is somehow... emasculating? 😄

good question.  first response... who cares?  feminine, masculine, tripartite...  who gives a flying flipper?

 

i was on a Posi 1 today on my Dark Dark Corr and those fools needed my pbaoe heal a lot.  i was annoyed, but i spammed it.  not fun, but necessary.  second response... not fun

 

on that same Dark Dark Corr i ran a Master LGTF (we got the badge!) and they needed no heals.  i debuffed, did AoE attack chains, had a blast.

 

third, and last response.  This is a Villain Archetype.  Villains are not nice.  They do not seek out power so they can patch up minions or the random co conspirator they meet.  buffing other players is, say it with me, NOT VILLAINOUS

 

Meaning of villain in English
 
villain
noun
uk  /ˈvɪl.ən/ us  /ˈvɪl.ən/
Add to word list 
[ C ]
a bad person who harms other people or breaks the law:
 
[ C ] UK informal
a criminal:
 
[ C ]
a character in a book, play, film, etc. who harms other people:

[MonteCarla]

Superman and Batman harm other people! Everyone in this game harms other people! Its how we get XP! 😄

So I must respectfully disagree with your thesis that damage and debuffs are for naughty villains and buffs are for nice heroes.

 

There's plenty of precedence for villains who empower their minions and sit back and let them take the lumps. Lex Luthor does it. Mystique and Destiny leading the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants do it. Morgana le Fey enchanting Mordred to go out and be her *ahem* little bitch on the battlefield does not make her less of a villain.

There's an entire villain AT in this game dedicated to doing exactly that. 

 

If you can do a Positron Task Force on your villainy villain, you can surely justify buffing the odd teammate in character too. 

 

If you don't find the playstyle fun, that's totally cool, and I'm glad that there are debuffing powersets for you to enjoy. Just like I'm glad that there are buffing sets for me to enjoy.