Category: Character Design

Change of plans

Hitting 41 is a power level for Psi-clone. I’d had Conserve Power (from the Power Mastery EPP) chosen for it … but …
Someone had mentioned that I really lacked a good AoE power. I looked back over what was available in Illusion Mastery, and it boils down to essentially two powers (assuming you don’t consider PA or Phantasm to be an AoE …):

  1. Flash: Does an AoE blind. Pros: Blinded opponents, and Controllers get the extra damage for subsequent attacks. Cons: TH penalty. PBAoE, so you have to run into the melee to use it. With I5, duration and max targets both suck.
  2. Spectal Terror: Placed AoE Fear, plus occasional Terror attacks. Essentially a stationary pet casting Fears. Pros: Pretty good TH. Fast recharge. Cool effect. Cons: Terror causes folks to run away. Fear does allow some attacks back. Area of effect is limited.

After some quick reading on the boards, decided to go with ST. Spent the evening playing with Psi-clone and Amorpha, and it’s pretty good. It isn’t a hard “hold,” but it definitely distracts the bad guys, and can be cast from a decent distance. Should be fun.

Grounded

My solo passtime of choice has been Eliza Dee (the one on Virtue (Elitists)). She’s doing great, up to 12 already, but …
… dammit, I’ve miscalced the power plans. She’s an Energy Aura secondary. At 10 I was supposed to take Entropy Shield for status protection, just on principle. But I was beginning to have damage problems, and someone I was playing with pointed out that Dampening Field was, unlike the Kinetic Shield toggle (Defense), an always-on Resist power.
Well, I flipped a coin and made the choice, and it was probably the right one, but, dagnabbit, I’ve suddenly entered the world of bad status attacks — whether Aberrent mezzes or varoius gun-toters knocking me on my ass. Since I’m soloing, status attacks are particularly lethal in result.
So at 12, I went ahead and took Entropy Shield. But … well, now I’m in trouble, because I was supposed to have taken Air Superiority instead as the pre-req for Fly at 14. I knew it was going to be a problem, but didn’t have any choice.
In retrospect, I would have taken Air Superiority at 6 rather than Bonesmasher — which is certainly an effective attack, but A/S would have been sufficient. If only we were getting a freespec in the next week or so …
Current design plans for Eliza …

Exported from version 1.5C of CoH Planner
http://joechott.com/coh

Archetype: Brute
Primary Powers – Ranged : Energy Melee
Secondary Powers – Support : Energy Aura

01 : Kinetic Shield defbuf(01) defbuf(7) defbuf(7) endred(25) endred(43)
01 : Energy Punch acc(01) dam(3) acc(11) dam(19) acc(37) dam(40)
02 : Barrage acc(02) dam(3) acc(5) dam(34) dam(34) acc(37)
04 : Bone Smasher acc(04) acc(5) dam(13) dam(34) acc(37) dam(40)
06 : Swift runspd(06)
08 : Whirling Hands acc(08) acc(9) endred(9) dam(11) dam(15) endred(19)
10 : Dampening Field damres(10) damres(27) damres(27)
12 : Entropy Shield endred(12) endred(13)
14 : Air Superiority acc(14) acc(15) dam(17) dam(17) dam(42) acc(43)
16 : Fly fltspd(16) fltspd(46)
18 : Health hel(18) hel(29) hel(40)
20 : Stamina endrec(20) endrec(21) endrec(21)
22 : Power Shield defbuf(22) defbuf(23) defbuf(23) endred(25) endred(46)
24 : Taunt tntdur(24)
26 : Hurdle jmp(26)
28 : Energy Drain acc(28) acc(29) endrec(31) endrec(33) acc(45) endrec(46)
30 : Energy Protection damres(30) damres(31) damres(31)
32 : Energy Transfer acc(32) acc(33) dam(33) dam(36) acc(42) dam(43)
35 : Conserve Power recred(35) recred(36) recred(36)
38 : Overload hel(38) defbuf(39) hel(39) defbuf(39)
41 : Energy Cloak endred(41) endred(42)
44 : Build Up recred(44) recred(45) recred(45)
47 : Stun acc(47) disdur(48) acc(48) disdur(48) acc(50)
49 : Hasten recred(49) recred(50) recred(50)
The intent is, if I actually run her, to grow Eliza Dee on Champion in the same course. (I decided to go for the Virtue version with the thought she’d be my “main” on that server, with Mister Thorne being the “main” on Champion.)
Brutes are a good solo choice — in retrospect, they’re a lot more like Scrappers than Tanks: heavy hitters but a bit fragile, with Death as a constant friend. The SMASH bar rocks, and, if managed well, they are faster progressing solo than Doms/MMs, and, I suspect, more surivable than Stalkers/Corrs.
At least they’re fun to play.

Character sketches

Best/scariest CoV design I’ve seen to date: Eggman, who is, esseintially, a giant chicken. Small monster legs in yellow, bright white body (including “wing” shoulders) with red trim, bald with a red crest, a yellow beak/breath mask, smoking a cigar …
Coolness.
Then, at Le Peep this morning, my eye was caught by a lady with longish blond hair wearling a short black pleated skirt and highish black leather boots, and I’m all, “Hey, I could make her in the character designer.”
I was even more amused to find out that Margie had spotted the same lady and had the same reaction. We decided her name would be Le Femme Peep, and our only question is whether she’s a hero or a villain …

Two by two into the Arc

We’re trying our darnedest to get Psi-clone and Amorpha into the Omega Level Clearance (the Body Snatchers, I think is the formal title) story arc. I’ve finally gotten the initial mish on it from the contact; Margie keeps trying added missions from him, as well as clearing other missions and stuff, to (as yet) no avail.
Still, plenty of Rikti goodness last night. Died, both of us, twice, on the same mission (each of ours — unsynced, so we didn’t get to both take mission credit on one). Mistakes on our part — rushing in and not having the sense to rush back out.
PC is being hampered a bit by

    … frelling Drones that both spot through the Invis and, themselves, don’t render on my screen until I’m practically in their visual range, too (is that a graphics setting problem or just the way it is? I can certainly see the Headmen and other full-size Rikti earlier on, and the Drones will reticle — they just aren’t visible until it’s nearly too late). Lesson: “Walk carefully, Grasshopper …” (a/k/a, “Don’t get cocky, kid”).

  • … the lack of perma-Hasten. Still have the power on PC, but it’s good for only about 2/3 the time, and the rest of the time I feel sluggish. That becomes a real issue when the balloon goes up and I need to pump A with heals and heal myself and call out Fred and his cousins to run interference and blind anything that moves and …
    Hrm. An AoE control might be of use. I might have to look into that Flash power I’ve never taken.

  • … the lack of status proection. I just picked up my “Restrained” badge last night, meaning I’ve been held/slept/mezzed a whole bunch. Not to mention (thanks again, Drones) knocked on my ass too often. Especially when A goes down and they all instantly turn their firepower on me … So I need to pop Breakfrees more, and I need to look into Acrobatics, and …

Hrm. Maybe a good thing I still have a trial respec.

Level best

2005-11-09_lynn.jpgQuick entry, just for the record. At home sick Mon-Wed, but managed to do a fair amount of relatively mindless Scrapper play (whether that means I was well enough to be at work I leave as an exercise for the reader).
In so doing, managed to get Amethyst Crown up to 13, and dinged Lynn Calodo up to 20 (at which point Valkyrie snarkily pointed out that Lynn could use a new outfit, and Lynn replied with an impolite gesture).
Scrapper solitaire is fun. I’m pretty sure I’m behind on whatever level Margie’s gotten Blue Point up to …
Meanwhile, we created another set of alts on CoV — Eliza Dee and Mistress Bacchante. Lots of fun.
2005-11-07_eliza-bacchante.jpgEliza is modelled after the JLU “Galatea” (who was the statue brought to life by Pygmalion, the title of Shaw’s updated play where Henry Higgins, reprising the title role, recreates Eliza Doolittle, hence her name). Funny thing is, Galatea is modelled somewhat after the DCU’s Power Girl, an Earth 2 Supergirl version (origin rebooted multiple times). So, after creating her — visually inspired by Galatea to the extent I could get the costume creator to do so — not 30 seconds had passed before someone ran by and said, “Evil PG, I like.”
*sigh*
Of course, then someone ran by saying, “nais ondies” (which, after a minute of puzzling, I translated to “nice undies,” but by then he was too far gone for Eliza to pummel him).
Eliza herself may, or may not, be based on another Paragon hero. She’s a Crey escapee, regardless, so …
Anyhoo, fun. Works well with Bacchante’s plant mastery.
Last, but not least, got both Psi-clone and Amorpha up to 39 last night, after an overly-long marathon session beating back the Rikti again (a/k/a Rikti farming off in some emergency-force-fielded neighborhood). Good, clean fun. Now, if we can just get to some of the 35-39 story arcs before we level out …

Parts is parts

Since CoV and CoH all share the same codebase and resources, why wouldn’t you be able to get CoV costume parts in CoH?
Answer: You probably will.

OK – here’s the most likely outcome…

If you own both games, you get all options – the new CoV sets will be accessible for your heroes.
Granted, most heroes don’t go around with barbed wire headbands and exposed brains and the like — but, then, that should be a player decision. If there’s no technical reason to prevent it, it shouldn’t be restricted.
If nothing else, it will be cool seeing “cat girls” with the CoV Cat Face feature. Not sure about “War Wolf” heroes, but, well, heck, why not?
And, of course, this eases (or does it trivialize?) the Villain Goes Good mechanics.
Now — when will this happen? Again, no reason (I can think of) why it wouldn’t be doable from Day 1, but believe it when you actually see it.
(Dave goes off and joneses for one of those cool leather jackets for PC …)

City of More Alts

2005-10-18_al.jpgYes, I know. I already have too many CoH characters. Way too many. Even just on Champion I have way too many. And, of course, there are the various character concepts I have over on CoV, and discussion of games going on over there.
So, naturally, I should be playing with another alt. This one’s still on the “Triumph” test bed, but I expect to rebuild him on Champion once I get my extra CoV slots there. Presenting Al McGordo. He’s a Rad/Rad Defender, a friendly sort of cowpoke from down New Mexico way, who just got a mite too close to some bad mutogenic radiation …
Now, of course, he needs to keep a few feet from everyone. And that mask, well, it’s not just for Western ambience. But he’s right courteous to the ladies, and does his part to make the world a better place.
My intent for him is actually as an “Offender,” stressing the offensive nature of his Defender powers (because, let’s face it — eye beams are kick-ass). He’ll probably take a heal or two, just ’cause, but his main thing will be to blast the baddies — a blaster with nice debuffs, vs. a healer/buffer with a bit of damage thrown in.
Most important, he just seems like he’d be fun to play. I have a story for him, a voice, and he (so far) solos pretty well, if need be.
Assuming I can timeslice some play time for him, of course.

Bring on the Bad Guys

2005-10-13_gifted-kid.jpgMargie and I are both in agreement that, well, we just both enjoy playing Heroes more than Villains. The CoV material is nice, certainly there are some decent tech advantages, and costume bits to die for — but I certainly feel better about myself and my characters when they’re protecting Paragon and its citizenry rather than when they’re tearing up Mercy Island and terrifying the annoying populace.
Still, there’s plenty of opportunity to do some fun bits. Such as The Gifted Kid, right. You know him — the one who always knew the answers in class, who always scored well on tests, who was better than everyone else and knew it … and who got beat up every day on the way home?
Well, if he couldn’t make any friends, he decided to … make some friends. (Mastermind Drones/Tech). He’s fun.


2005-10-13_villains.jpgAnd then there’s these guys. On the right is Dr. Lotte Lenya, of the Rosa Klebb Institute. She enjoys … needles. On the left is …
… hey, haven’t we seen him before? Well, anyway, goes by the name Psy-clone (Dominator Mind/Psy). Looks kind of untrustworthy.
Lots of great villain names out there — indeed, half the fun of CoV right now is seeing what other people have come up with. Now if only some of those costume bits can be brought over to CoH …
UPDATE: Some great Alliance commentary, with many Secret Base screen shots, here.

Mister Ravenous

2005-10-12_cov.jpgSince the CoV NDA is now lifted, I present you with … Mr. Ravenous.
A sophisticated soul is he, cultured, refined, an enjoyer of the better things in life. The only time he actually finds himself getting put out — even to the point of getting a bit hot under the collar and leading him to become exercised and even, dare we say, hostile — is when someone interferes with his hobbies and predilections. Such as, for example, the consumption of human flesh. It’s not easy, gentle reader, being a connoisseur in a world of barbarians and puritans …
Brute, Inv/SS. Fun stuff. Love watching the “brute” bar go up as he hits/gets hit. He’ll get all reset once the test gets finished, but he’ll be my first CoV character out the chute, should I choose to actually do that.

The Great Leap Forward

Huzzah and hey-nonny-nonny — Fazenda and Araware both dinged up to 14, which means …
Travel Power!
There’s something fabulously liberating about a Travel Power. The worst part of the early levels is, frankly, trotting from one end of one zone to another. Even if you avoid awfuls like the Hollows, just jogging around Kings Row gets to be a boring PitA — and maneuvering around new zones like Steel and Skyway become seriously risky.
Travel Powers suddenly let you treat zones much more point-to-point, with minimal time going from A to B. Nice.
For Aware it was Super Jump, a very fine power that I use on most of my characters (PC being the obvious exception). For Fazenda, though, it’s something different — Teleport. C’mon, she’s a stage magician — what else would she take?
Already seeing/experiencing the various problems — high endurance cost, vulnerability where you arrive, etc. I need to do some fancy macro work to make the whole process easier (and add a “tag line” to the effort).
I dunno. SJ is probably my favorite so far, just for general utility. Fly is great for PC because he can chat while he does so. TP is going to be good “color” — let’s see how effective it actually is.
Still working on her voice — doing the Irish thing without either overdoing it or crossing over into Scottish — and on her “busines” — card tricks, coin tricks, pulling a lit cigarette out of places, etc.
Interestingly, even as Fazenda works on her voice, Araware is turning out to be quite the chatterbox on the comms, relatively speaking. Margie tends to play quieter characters, so hearing Araware waxing lyrical on metaphysics is pretty fun.
Ran last night with another Storm Knight for an adventure, which gave a little variation. He complemented us on how good of a team we were, which we are (all of our current duos are pretty kick-ass, with the possible exception of Velvet/P-Siren, who are good but not great, at least in terms of DPS).
In between mishes, we managed to get hooked up with a Troll Rave in Skyway, a good first test of our travel powers. Which was fine, except (a) we got teamed up with Sword of Asgard, (b) we didn’t SK, so (c) we were both very squishy (and both died at least once) and got hardly any XP. Still, worth it for the exposure. Fazenda’s definitely about the publicity.
We have a Storm Knights Meet-n-Beat on Monday, so we’ll see how the characters stack up at that point. At the very least, we’ll see if I can avoid addressing them as “Consortium” like I did on the SG comms last night.

Level Best

Aside from getting Torchielle and Kazima up to 21 over the weekend (with some Friday and Saturday prep, and the Synapse TF wrapping it up), we also dinged Psi-clone and Amorpha to 36. W00T!
Actually considering a Respec on PC. While I like his power set, as I was tossing slots into him I realized that I have a hell of a lot of recharges on various powers (Group Invis, Phantom Army, Recovery Aura, with more to come). Enough that it might be worth sacrificing a power slot to Hasten and perma it, and in return free up another 5-6 slots.
Being able to heal faster could come in handy sometimes, too.
Of course, there is no power I want to give up. Dagnabbit.
Archetype: Controller
Primary Powers – Ranged : Illusion Control
Secondary Powers – Support : Empathy
01 : Healing Aura hel(01) endred(5) hel(13) hel(7) hel(33)
01 : Spectral Wounds dam(01) dam(3) acc(5) dam(11) dam(36)
02 : Deceive cnfdur(02) cnfdur(3) acc(7) rng(11)
04 : Heal Other hel(04) hel(13) hel(15) endred(17) hel(33)
06 : Hover fltspd(06)
08 : Blind hlddur(08) acc(9) endred(9) hlddur(17) acc(34)
10 : Air Superiority acc(10) dam(27)
12 : Group Invisibility recred(12) recred(15) recred(19) recred(19) recred(21) recred(21)
14 : Fly endred(14) endred(36)
16 : Hurdle jmp(16)
18 : Phantom Army recred(18) recred(25) recred(27) recred(31)
20 : Swift runspd(20)
22 : Stamina endrec(22) endrec(23) endrec(23) endrec(25) endrec(29) endrec(29)
24 : Fortitude defbuf(24)
26 : Maneuvers endred(26)
28 : Recovery Aura recred(28) recred(31) recred(34)
30 : Tactics thtbuf(30) endred(31) thtbuf(34)
32 : Phantasm acc(32) dam(33) dam(36)
35 : Resurrect endred(35)
The next two powers — Adrenaline Boost and Conserve Power — end up being recred-heavy as well. Power Boost at 47 is the same. So there’s some real value there.
Problem is, what to give up? PC is such a utility player that he’s got a wide variety of powers in his Primary and Secondary, plus Leadership. All of them are key parts of his strategy.
Rrg. The least important is Rez (already pushed back to this level a while back); I could take it (again) at 37, if I were willing to give up a future power — the ones I’ve mentioned above, plus TI and Vengeance. Again, doable, but then I need to shuffle things a bit (shove Rez off, take Hasten earlier so I can have it perma by now).
I also hate to add the Hasten glowy to myself. Just not me. But …

World of Tiers

The decades of character experience each have their own qualities to them — to the extent, at least, that I’m able to identify them.
1-9: Crude and Unformed
At the beginning levels, it’s all about a few fresh powers and testing character concepts. There’s not a lot to differentiate characters or missions, just the freshness of it all. There’s a lot of initial turnover here, but these levels tend to go so (relatively) fast that it’s pretty easy to survive.
10-19: Make or Break
By this time the difficulty is begining to ratchet up and the time-to-level is increasing. Steel Canyon and Skyway provide new places to live, and die. TFs show up, giving a way to seriously immerse in the character and team with others. Most of the leveling here is taken up with getting a travel power, bumping up Hasten, and struggling for Stamina. DOs and paying for them become an issue.
I find this is the level where (my) characters tend to stall, as their limitations in play and personality become clear. I’ve dropped many more characters in this range (esp. right around 15) than in the first decade.
20-29: Establishing a Rep
Characters come into their own. Basic power sets are in place, the basic supporting powers (travel, stamina) are taken, and now differentiation can occur. Missions move to IP/Talos, and become a lot more interesting. SOs show up. Major story arcs become more visible, and there are a large number of TFs. Respecs and costume changes become available.
More importantly, I’ve found that the heroes who make it to this level start getting a lot more involved in SG events and social chit-chat. They become known, and get to know others. Enough activities take place jumping off of IP/Talos that their survivability there (not to mention being able to travel and having a breadth of powers) lets folks be easily SKed. In short, the social network for heroes solidifies here (though it requires maintenance), and adds a new level of enjoyability to the game.
These levels are long, but rich. In my (limited) experience, my alts who make it into this range are solid.
30-39: Living Large
Glory days. Founders Falls and Crey’s Folly. Rikti and Crey and the return of the Circle of Thorns, not to mention Devouring Earth. Money stops being so much of a problem. Get this far and you are a competent, powerful, hero, as well balanced as the constantly changing landscape of new issues can allow.
Characters at this level seem unlikely to be dropped (after all that investment) but might stall.
40-49: Thousand Yard Stare
This one I can’t speak to from direct experience (just yet). My impression, reading from other people, is that heroes that get here tend to be (a) key SG members who get much involved in group activities, and (b) obsessed with getting to 50 (especially when there are dire warnings about future nerfs). Long levels and long TFs/Trials can make this something of a slog.
50: Top o’ the World, Ma!
Hero of the City. Now what? Either act as elder statesman (so to speak), fostering others activities and playing socially — or else roll up a Kheldian and begin the cycle again.
Any other thoughts?

A dark and windy night

2005-09-21_lynn.jpgSo I made up for a full day (and I mean a full “Working from home because there’s not a gap to drive to the office, and wiping out a battery’s worth of cell phone time on meetings, plus added meetings beyond that” day) of work, followed by house tidying, followed by a long meeting down at church … by staying up too late playing CoH. Indeed, Margie was headed upstairs at 10 about the time that I was firing things up to begin play.
That all said, and granted that it was 1:30 a.m. or so when I went up, it was both therapeutic and productive. I did the respec on her to the “LC3” build, and that worked pretty well for me against the Clockwork and Council I ran up against. Did some time teaming with Toxin Infection (Rad/Rad Def) from Exodus, which worked out quite nicely; Rad Infection is da bomb for scrapper partners. “It’s like a glowy pet!” we said, herding along one hapless cog from encounter to encounter …
Ultimately (and why I ended up playing so long) I dinged to 16 (Unyielding — and just in time to get a Tsoo assignment as I signed off). I also got the “Tough” badge (100K of damage, I believe), which was both gratifying and and a nice badge to wear IC.
I also took a title. Titles are tough for non-traditional heroes. I skipped over it last level, for just that reason. Lynn isn’t the sort to call herself (or accept being called) “Wonderful” or “Heroic.” I finally chose “The Awesome Lynn Calodo,” because if a teenage girl can’t calll herself “awesome,” who can. Plus she’d get a kick thinking of it as being the same as “Awful.”

Problem Child

So I’m looking to respec Lynn, since I feel like she’s way too brittle right now under I5. Here’s the current version; she’s at SL15, so I’ve noted the things she doesn’t yet have:
Lynn Calodo #1
Archetype: Scrapper
Primary Powers – Ranged : Dark Melee
Secondary Powers – Support : Invulnerability
01 : Resist Physical Damage damres(01) damres(7) damres(9)
01 : Smite dam(01) acc(3) dam(5) dam(7) // dam(29)
02 : Shadow Maul acc(02) dam(3) dam(5) dam(9) // dam(31)
04 : Dull Pain recred(04) recred(11) recred(11) recred(13)
06 : Combat Jumping endred(06)
08 : Shadow Punch dam(08)
10 : Swift runspd(10)
12 : Hasten recred(12) recred(13) recred(15) recred(15) // recred(17) recred(19)
14 : Super Jump jmp(14)
====
16 : Unyielding damres(16) damres(17) damres(19) damres(23) damres(27) damres(29)
18 : Health Empty(18)
20 : Stamina Empty(20)
22 : Kick (Fight) acc(22)
24 : Tough damres(24)
26 : Weave defbuf(26) defbuf(27)
28 : Invincibility thtbuf(28) thtbuf(31)
30 : Soul Drain dam(30)
Present build (enh slotted fully to only 21), designed for I4 along the non-toggle approach to Inv, since then nerfed. Too brittle in the DR area (though even the builds below don’t help that much at this level and with only even-level DOs). Ignore the future Weave — it looked a lot better in I4, and I’d already changed my mind on it.

Lynn Calodo #2
01 : Resist Physical Damage damres(01)
01 : Smite acc(01) acc(3) dam(5)
02 : Shadow Maul acc(02) acc(3) dam(5) dam(9) // dam(31)
04 : Dull Pain recred(04) recred(7) recred(7) recred(9)
06 : Combat Jumping endred(06)
08 : Temp Invulnerability damres(08) damres(11) damres(11) // damres(17) damres(19) damres(19)
10 : Swift runspd(10)
12 : Hasten recred(12) recred(13) recred(13) recred(15) recred(15) // recred(17)
14 : Super Jump jmp(14)
====
16 : Unyielding damres(16) damres(27) damres(29) damres(29) damres(31) damres(31)
18 : Health hel(18) hel(21)
20 : Stamina endrec(20) endrec(23) endrec(21) endrec(25) endrec(25) endrec(27)
22 : Siphon Life acc(22) hel(23)
24 : Shadow Punch acc(24)
26 : Dark Consumption acc(26)
28 : Invincibility defbuf(28)
30 : Soul Drain acc(30)
32 : Midnight Grasp acc(32)
This version gets rid of RPD extra slots, and adds in TI (at the expense of my third DM attack, Shadow Punch, which waits until 24, leaving me with two DMs and Brawl). Better, but I hate losing my attack chain like that.
The approach here is the idea that you can cap Lethal/Smash Resistance in Scrappers(70%) with 6xUny, 1xRPD, 6xTI (76% with even SOs — so it’s all off in the distant future anyhow). The Uny also then gives you some res to Elemental and Energy dmg, too. I would just as soon (on principle plus not needing it) avoid Tough from the Fighting pool, which is also used to hit the cap.

Lynn Calodo #3
01 : Resist Physical Damage damres(01)
01 : Smite acc(01) acc(3) dam(5) dam(17)
02 : Shadow Maul acc(02) acc(3) dam(5) dam(9) // dam(31)
04 : Dull Pain recred(04) recred(7) recred(7) recred(9) recred(13) recred(13)
06 : Combat Jumping endred(06)
08 : Temp Invulnerability damres(08) damres(11) damres(11) // damres(17) damres(19) damres(19)
10 : Swift runspd(10)
12 : Shadow Punch acc(12) dam(15) dam(15)
14 : Super Jump jmp(14)
====
16 : Unyielding damres(16) damres(27) damres(29) damres(29) damres(31) damres(31)
18 : Health hel(18) hel(21)
20 : Stamina endrec(20) endrec(23) endrec(21) endrec(25) endrec(25) endrec(27)
22 : Siphon Life acc(22) hel(23)
24 : Dark Consumption acc(24)
26 : Hurdle jmp(26)
28 : Invincibility defbuf(28)
30 : Soul Drain acc(30)
32 : Midnight Grasp acc(32)
Replaces Hasten. Adds enh slots to perma-DP, uses the power slot to get Shadow Punch that much earlier. Much nicer, and I’m seriously considering this, though it’s almost blasphemous to get rid of Hasten with a Scrapper. But it’s a pretty quick attack chain regardless, if I’ve permaed DP is not as big a deal, and it frees up a lot of enh slots.
Thoughts?

Because what I need is another alt …

At breakfast last Sunday, I didn’t have a book with me. Margie had her usual sheaf of CoH forum print-outs, so after tormenting myself with the Hypertension Induction Which Is The Perspective Section of the Sunday Paper, I borrowed some of what she’d brought to read for myself.
Which was a mistake, of course, because doing that always makes me want to generate an alt. And the fact is, I already had one in mind …
screenshot_2005-09-20_amethyst.jpgBehold Amethyst Crown, exiled queen of another dimension, here on a path seeking honor and glory, the defeat of ancestral enemies of her people — and, perhaps, a way home. Broadsword/Regen Scrapper, boo-yah.
I’d build a prototype of her on Triumph a while back, so I claim prior art to the Broadsword/Regen Scrapper that Margie was playing with in Pinnacle (!) this evening. And after we did some Fazenda/Araware, I went ahead and built her.
Oh, yeah. Very nice. Carved a bloody path up one side of Galaxy City and down the other. Had her to 4 in no time …
… and got a blind request for a PUG. Well, what the heck, I thought.
Until I got there, and found out it was a level 4-6 group, and the contents of mish were, for whatever reason, level 8 Clockworks. Yup, a good buttload of purple there.
The team was rough to start out with — the 8 of us, of course — and there were some odd flakiness from a number of people at different times.
But we persevered. And even though we died, individually, there were never any TPKs (close, at the beginning, but never quite), and folks had plenty of Awakens, and we had a kick-ass healer who, even at a low level, kept us going. And going. And going.
Ding. Ding. Ding.
AC went up three full levels over the course of the mish, and 3.5 pips into a 4th. The bad guys went from all purple to a few reds, a few oranges, and a lot of yellow and whites. Excellent.
I like her. I like the power set, primary and secondary. And I like the character (though I haven’t had much opportunity to RP her). I think she’s going to be a keeper.
As much as any of my characters are keepers.
Now … when do we get cross-server transfer …?

R-E-S-P-E-C-Vee

Finally got onto I5 with Velvet, and did the necessary Respec, going to a much more toggle-heavy build that should take care of her nicely.
Current build (bearing in mind that she’s just 28):

  • 01 : Jab endred(01) dam(3) dam(17) dam(37) dam(39) dam(40)
  • 01 : Temp Invulnerability damres(01) damres(5) damres(7) damres(11) damres(19) damres(25)
  • 02 : Punch endred(02) dam(3) dam(13) dam(31) dam(39) dam(39)
  • 04 : Dull Pain recred(04) recred(5) recred(7) recred(15) recred(15) recred(19)
  • 06 : Combat Jumping jmp(06)
  • 08 : Unyielding damres(08) damres(9) damres(9) damres(11) damres(13) endred(17)
  • 10 : Taunt tntdur(10)
  • 12 : Swift runspd(12)
  • 14 : Super Jump jmp(14)
  • 16 : Health hel(16) hel(31) hel(33) hel(34) hel(36) hel(36)
  • 18 : Invincibility endred(18) thtbuf(29) defbuf(27)
  • 20 : Stamina endrec(20) endrec(21) endrec(21) endrec(23) endrec(23) endrec(25)
  • 22 : Resist Physical Damage damres(22)
  • 24 : Air Superiority dam(24) dam(27) dam(31) dam(34) dam(34) dam(40)
  • 26 : Knockout Blow dam(26) dam(33) dam(37) dam(42) dam(42) dam(43)
  • 28 : Rage recred(28) recred(29) recred(33) recred(36) recred(40) recred(43)

City of Alts, Book V

Last night …

  1. Spent most of our online time last night as Velvet and P-Siren, since Invuln and Bubbles took it particularly hard from the nerf bat for I5.
    It had been some weeks since we’d done much with the pair. One thing we immediately learned was that most of our mishes were old, old, old — the last activity had been at least one TF, if not more.
    After about an hour of bashing grays (and seeing how much damage they actually did me), Seventy-Six came on with an RFH, so we joined up with him. Sort of. Nobody else answer the call, so only one of us could SK up. Bubbles don’t scale, so it made most sense for PS to be the 28 on a level 46 mission. That said, she soon discovered how the Malta could one-shot her if they spotted her.
    The mish was actually pretty straightforward, even though 76 had set it back up to Invincible. I found I needed to run all my toggles — TI, Unyielding, and Invincible — to keep damage down to an acceptible steady stream. Never touched Dull Pain, though, which was good, I guess.
    “Watch out for ambushes when we get out,” 76 warned. We exited. Looked around. Nada. Beat up on some gray Vahz nearby (the mish was in Steel). Nada. “Well, then …”
    Whoosh. Three Titan battlesuits unleash missiles on 76. We run in. He goes down. I follow fairly quickly.
    Well, heck. I head to hospital. Get out. Look around for 76.
    He’s on his feet — he’s yellow, he’s orange, he’s …
    I get over there in time to see him down already. He goes to hospital this time — and I see the mob of lvl 47-48 Malta making their way across Steel toward him.
    He heads back, we beat up a couple, the rest vanish. Mercifully. It would have been a painful pull back to the Perez gate for the policfe bots; too many people at the close Yellow Line station to be able to risk that.
    Learned what I needed though, and what I suspected, i.e., drop RPD, figure out a way to get Tough. I put together the respec … and learned I’d already taken my free one, so what I had was my TF one, and I really didn’t feel like running to wherever dude is to make it happen. So I shut Velvet down.
    Main disad to the respec, aside from the question of how well it will work (I should be able to get, at this level, to the 90% damage cap with Unyielding, Temp Invuln, and Tough, but just) is that I can’t take Air Superiority, unless I forego Hasten for the future, which I’d rather not. Not enough Power Pools once I get into the (urg) Fighting Pool (to the get the invulnerabilit that Invuln no longer gives me).
    No idea how much Endurance this will all suck, but …

  2. The streets were even more full of archers and sonics, and frustrated people trying to come up with more unique names for both (most ignoring the common advice of adding an honoriffic or title — “Lady Longbow,” “Captain Scream” — or a gender designation — “Sonic Blast Man,” “Longbow Lass” — or even a name — “Screaming Sally,” “Bob the Bowman” — to get a unique moniker).
    Meantime, Atlas had to spawn an Atlas 2 because of the traffic, and starting off with a new character was frustrating because both Contaminated and Hellions were being taken out much faster than the game would spawn them.

  3. One unexpected bonus of I5 is that it seems to have fixed the in-game e-mail system — or, at least, it freed up some e-mail that had never gotten through.
  4. The revised Outbreak is fine, though having to hit an Info kiosk to learn more about enhancements was annoying. Flower Knight is also kind of annoying — either she dives into battle while you’re still going over to the glowy computer, or else she’s in the very last room, and so worthless.
  5. Margie rerolled Mrs. Azure to change her from FF to Sonic secondary (still Mind Control primary). I’ll be SKing her up to get her up to the Mister’s level. She quickly discovered that the Controller “Containment” damage boost worked great …
    She also rerolled Star Protector to be an Empathy/Sonic … er, Sonic/Empathy … well, not sure which, but he had both powers, which Margie seemed to be happeier with than the Kinetics/Dark Defender he was before.
    Only problem — with both characters she failed to “empty the pockets” before deleting the old version. Which was costly with Mrs. Azure …
    I decided what-the-hell and went ahead and created Big Lungs on Champion, only slightly tweaking the design. To do that, I had to drop Truly Unstable, who was fun as a character, but I didn’t really care for the Rad/Rad power set. Twelve levels, easy come, easy go.
    Big Lungs and Star Protector did a bit of running around. Lots of screaming, so to speak. Worked well.

  6. With the ‘rents in town this weekend, not sure how much CoH we’ll get, but that might be just as well as people get used to I5.
    Certainly I have no intention of going near Croatoa for a while, nor Icon. CC chatter was pretty quiet last night (I waggishly opined that everyone was intimidated by the new CC guidelines); more chatter in the SG channel, but mostly OOC on I5.