City Of Heroes Tues/Thur Group

[hoopsguy]

Just a heads up, Don (and other alts) will be out for about a week. Work trip is taking me to San Francisco for the next few days. Catch up with everyone next Tuesday or Wednesday.

[Raiders Army]

Awww....take care, and don't take steriods while you're there. Don's big enough.

[Bonegavel]

Hehe. Take care and we'll keep the home-fires burning.

We gobbled up a bunch of XP last night on PI, if only for a short time. Was good that we quit because I'm at the leading edge of a cold and the Alka Seltzer + that I took put me on the other side of groggy (the side where your desire for sleep is almost oppressive).

Hoping that we can grow the flock some. If that means letting in non-FOFCers, we will probably have to sit and have a Palaver because that kind of destroys the point of the group (emphasis on 'kind of').

Glad Streak is back.

We just need to get PV and Comet on at the same time as the rest of us and we should be good to go!

[Bonegavel]

dola,

they made more changes to Invuln tankers and put we regeners back to almost what we were. Don will now be mobile as Unyielding Stance is now called Unyielding. Things have been lowered, but the power is not rooted and it can be run with Temp Invulnerability.

I can't wait to take Ramble off the shelf when Issue 3 goes live to test it out.

[mtsouth]

OK. I got on Victory last night and played some with my Sci/Def Nook M (Radiation based....could you guess?). I'm level 2 since I only got to play for an hour. Let me know what AT you guys need and I'll create a character for the group.

[Qwikshot]

Almost have Green Drake to 9, and possibly 10 tonight, which I think would be a nice improvement...

Fire/SS is definately not a true tank (though it might be because I'm lacking Healing Flames right now).

I envision Green Drake to be like a tougher scrapper...I like the class, but no AOEs, so he's more of a boss buster. I'm still waiting before I grab taunt just to see how this is all going to work.

More than likely, I'll be loading up on pool powers (it's sort of nice to grab the electives first, that way when you actually are high up, you are picking at things like hasten, and the like).

I will forego travel powers for a while, simply b/c so many teamates can TP.

[gi]

Originally Posted by mtsouth

OK. I got on Victory last night and played some with my Sci/Def Nook M (Radiation based....could you guess?). I'm level 2 since I only got to play for an hour. Let me know what AT you guys need and I'll create a character for the group.

Of the players that play often here are the ATs:

Project Virus: Spine Scrapper
Albino Claw: Claw Scrapper
Aucoin: Empathy Defender (Healer)
Silver Streak: Electric Blaster
Hangfire: Fire Blaster
Don the Baptist: Inv Tank
Gail-force: Gravity Controller
Cometflash: Rad Defender (oh where are you my cometflash?)

Miss anyone? Choose whatever AT will give you the most fun.

[mtsouth]

Cool. Thanks for the info. Will try to look for you guys tonight. I'm thinking maybe a Tech Rifle Blaster would a nice change. Maybe something else.

[C.J.]

Originally Posted by Bonegavel

If that means letting in non-FOFCers, we will probably have to sit and have a Palaver because that kind of destroys the point of the group (emphasis on 'kind of').

Hee hee hee! [Gail hides her shameful face.]

[Bonegavel]

Originally Posted by C.J.

Hee hee hee! [Gail hides her shameful face.]

Hey, you are an official FOFCer now. Besides, you were sponsored by a member that knows you in the real world.

[C.J.]

Originally Posted by gi

Of the players that play often here are the ATs:
...
Gail-Storm: Gravity Controller
...

Uhh...that's "Gail-Force", GI.
Silly sponser.

[Raiders Army]

I think we call you Gail, and many people don't get the "Gale Force" reference.

[Qwikshot]

Originally Posted by gi

Of the players that play often here are the ATs:

Project Virus: Spine Scrapper (off hour mega destroyer)
Albino Claw: Claw Scrapper (scrappy pale white ex 80's rock star)
Aucoin: Empathy Defender (Healer) (pretty boy who runs /and heals/)
Silver Streak: Electric Blaster (goatee'd benevolent zapper)
Hangfire: Fire Blaster (dies ALOT, I mean ALOT, but also goes BOOM)
Don the Baptist: Inv Tank (the man with the 3rd eye and zealous flock)
Gail-Storm: Gravity Controller (has more outfits than a Vegas show)
Cometflash: Rad Defender (Missed & M.I.A.)

Miss anyone? Choose whatever AT will give you the most fun.

Also Green Drake: Big Mean Green Tank

[gi]

Originally Posted by C.J.

Uhh...that's "Gail-Force", GI.
Silly sponser.

Who are you again? Sorry....hard time remembering small people in this world....

[mtsouth]

Is there something I can type to find out if you guys are online?

[Raiders Army]

I'm not sure, but you could try giving one of us a tell:

/t , hey

like: "/t silver streak, hey"

We're on on Tuesday and Thursday nights about 8-11 EST (as per the title of the thread).

[gi]

Originally Posted by mtsouth

Is there something I can type to find out if you guys are online?

Add us to your friend list.

/friend name

example:

/friend aucoin

Have to do it for each one.

You will be notified if we are online and you can click the friend tab to keep track of us.

[JeeberD]

I've got some free time tonight, so I'm going to log on as Flaming Homer. I'll give y'all a yell if you don't mind a lowly level 12 hanging with you...

[JeeberD]

Dola- Errr...make that Homer J. Been too damn long and I've forgotten the names of my guys...

[mtsouth]

Got my Mutant Mind Controller up to level 4 last night. Thought he would be a nice mix once he gets powered up. Between confusing baddies and using his force fields for protection, he is better in support than solo. Will try the friend thing tonight if I feel better. Dang cold/allergies/sinus crap.

[gi]

Originally Posted by mtsouth

Got my Mutant Mind Controller up to level 4 last night. Thought he would be a nice mix once he gets powered up. Between confusing baddies and using his force fields for protection, he is better in support than solo. Will try the friend thing tonight if I feel better. Dang cold/allergies/sinus crap.

What be your name?

[hoopsguy]

Got my Mutant Mind Controller up to level 4 last night. Thought he would be a nice mix once he gets powered up. Between confusing baddies and using his force fields for protection, he is better in support than solo

This becomes even more true of controllers as you advance in levels, up until getting pets anyways - that is a long ways away from level 4. So I would definitely encourage you to either look us up or begin experimenting with random teams when you get some level of confidence built up about how to play your character. Speaking as a character who gets absolutely owned by mind control at later levels, I hope you have an equally big impact on our foes.

Looking forward to playing with you at some point. Also should be good to have Jeeber back in the fold.

[C.J.]

Very true of controllers. They are quite challenging to play. Better suited for grouping early on, but soloing is not impossible. I'd say past level 34 is when you start to realize the power of a controller. Pets should be fully slotted at 34...then at 35 and 38 you get your final 2ndary powers.

I'm able to solo decent sized mobs of even or greater level with little threat of dying. At level 38, Gail-Force can take on a group of 6-8 level 41 minions, or a smaller group of 42's with maybe a LT or two. So +3 or +4 mobs are not too much trouble. Pretty good for an AT that's supposed to be a support character and deals very little damage compared to other AT's.

Some things that help me out aside from Singularities and my Thunderstorm power (and other controller goodies):

- 6 slotted stamina and health
- 6 slotted hasten
- Phase shift from the concealment power pool...this is my panic button. If the mobs are doing major damage to me, I can turn this on and be "untouchable" while my singularities and thunderstorm continue to attack.

BTW, Gail dinged to 39 last night. Epic power pools here I come.

[mtsouth]

Mentallmo....yellow and black costume.

I know I've got a ways to go to catch up with you guys. I'm hoping at his peak that he can help turn the tide by using mind control to disable/confuse/turn enemies while using force fields to protect other teammates (deflection or insulation shields). Based on what I'm seeing, I won't get a pet.

[JeeberD]

It was fun hooking up with you guys again last night. I'm over halfway to level 14 now, and I might try to get there my myself this afternoon. I'm not sure how often I'll be able to join up with you (I usually get off of work on Tues and Thurs right around when y'all are logging off), but I'll try to make myself more available...

[gi]

Originally Posted by mtsouth

Mentallmo....yellow and black costume.

I know I've got a ways to go to catch up with you guys. I'm hoping at his peak that he can help turn the tide by using mind control to disable/confuse/turn enemies while using force fields to protect other teammates (deflection or insulation shields). Based on what I'm seeing, I won't get a pet.

If no one is on but us, I will be more than happy to help power level you. With my buffs and heals you should go through levels fast. Or I can bring on an alt to assist.

[hoopsguy]

Also, City of Heroes includes a nice feature called sidekick that allows higher level guys to bring up a lower level character to effectively 2 levels lower than the high level guy.

New Hero: Level 5
Veteran Hero: Level 35
New Hero fights at Level 33 with Veteran Hero. Powers, health, all scale upwards, although you don't have the benefit of additional powers and slots that would accumulate with natural levels.

Aucoin is a very helpful character for keeping you alive while power-leveling, although he isn't going to be a ton of help bringing down the bad guys. You have to do that dirty work yourself when working with him.

[gi]

Which is why SK'ing doesn't work very well when I am the highest level guy. We can try it again, but generally I've found you can earn more xp with me just following you around buffing and healing you. I'm open to anything though.

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

Also, City of Heroes includes a nice feature called sidekick that allows higher level guys to bring up a lower level character to effectively 2 levels lower than the high level guy.

New Hero: Level 5
Veteran Hero: Level 35
New Hero fights at Level 33 with Veteran Hero. Powers, health, all scale upwards, although you don't have the benefit of additional powers and slots that would accumulate with natural levels.

Aucoin is a very helpful character for keeping you alive while power-leveling, although he isn't going to be a ton of help bringing down the bad guys. You have to do that dirty work yourself when working with him.

[Bonegavel]

Sorry to say but I don't think Mind Controllers get pets. I got Silent Partner to level 14 and once I learned about pets I kind of put him in stasis. Still, Silent Partner is fun, but I've spent most of my time with Albino Claw trying to get him to 50.

[mtsouth]

Cool. I'll try to get on early and "friend" everyone. I've completed two missions so far (clearing warehouse and stop painting thieves). I'll be on around 7:30 PM EST with a possible Joey break @ 8 and then back on for a bit after 8:30 depending on how I feel.

[Raiders Army]

I'll be on tonight with Streak, so I'll look for you guys; however, my son has a orchestra concert tonight at 7:00, with Survivor and the Apprentice on as well.

[Bonegavel]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

I'll be on tonight with Streak, so I'll look for you guys; however, my son has a orchestra concert tonight at 7:00, with Survivor and the Apprentice on as well.

Damn, looks like you're down for the count.

Hey, log into the game with streak, team up with me and let me remove some of your debt while you watch TV! I feel so guilty about your 1.6 million debt from last night.

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by Bonegavel

Damn, looks like you're down for the count.

Hey, log into the game with streak, team up with me and let me remove some of your debt while you watch TV! I feel so guilty about your 1.6 million debt from last night.

Hey I'm a blaster, it's what I do. I wouldn't worry about it. I seem to remember getting you killed numerous times about a month and a half ago.

Shit happens, right? (was going to say stuff, but it just didn't sound right)

[Bonegavel]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

Hey I'm a blaster, it's what I do. I wouldn't worry about it. I seem to remember getting you killed numerous times about a month and a half ago.

Shit happens, right? (was going to say stuff, but it just didn't sound right)

Shit happens indeed.

I wracked up about ~90k debt last night myself. Got it down into the 20s I think. We went on a rampage around the docks. That group was kickin' it yo!

[Raiders Army]

And Mentallmo is a SG member...a GM of course.

[C.J.]

Sweet night of SuperGroup gaming everyone. Sorry for the low missions I seem to still have. Glad Gail could be of some traveling help to Green Drake and Mentallmo.

Just was wondering about the Mind Control / no pets thing again. Pets are pretty powerful, I wonder what they did to balance Mind Control out so it has equal advantages, despite the fact that it doesn't have a pet. My only guess can be that Mind Control powers seem to do a lot of Psionic damage. Most of the defenses in this game protect against everything EXCEPT psionic damage. You'd figure the villans have the same restrictions on defense, so they're quite vulnerable to that form of damage.. Anyone else have any ideas? Just wondering why that's the only controller with no pets available (or even better, why does illusion get 2 pets and 1 pseudo pet.)

[gi]

Originally Posted by C.J.

Sweet night of SuperGroup gaming everyone. Sorry for the low missions I seem to still have. Glad Gail could be of some traveling help to Green Drake and Mentallmo.

Just was wondering about the Mind Control / no pets thing again. Pets are pretty powerful, I wonder what they did to balance Mind Control out so it has equal advantages, despite the fact that it doesn't have a pet. My only guess can be that Mind Control powers seem to do a lot of Psionic damage. Most of the defenses in this game protect against everything EXCEPT psionic damage. You'd figure the villans have the same restrictions on defense, so they're quite vulnerable to that form of damage.. Anyone else have any ideas? Just wondering why that's the only controller with no pets available (or even better, why does illusion get 2 pets and 1 pseudo pet.)

For Illusion, I know it is balanced by the fact that the damage is not real and will heal after a little while.

[C.J.]

Yes, but the damage doesn't seem to heal back fast enough to make it a real factor if you're persistent with attacking. And, even though the damage isn't "real" from illusion, foes can still die from it.

But for Mind Control, I suppose they also have a lot of powers to make villans attack each other. Nice because it "thins" the crowd out and weakens them...but drawback is you don't get XP from any kills that happen from that.

I'll have to pull up the hero planner and have a look at it again. I guess I'm so interested now mainly because I can't remember why I picked Gravity for Gail instead of something else.

[gi]

Originally Posted by C.J.

Yes, but the damage doesn't seem to heal back fast enough to make it a real factor if you're persistent with attacking. And, even though the damage isn't "real" from illusion, foes can still die from it.

But for Mind Control, I suppose they also have a lot of powers to make villans attack each other. Nice because it "thin" the crowd out and weakens them...but drawback is you don't get XP from any kills that happen from that.

I'll have to pull up the hero planner and have a look at it again. I guess I'm so interested now mainly because I can't remember why I picked Gravity for Gail instead of something else.

The dam really does heal back fast. I'll bring on Maiden Io to show you.

[C.J.]

strange. I can't seem to think of any "drawbacks" to any gravity powers other than Dimension Shift. Propel is kinda crappy because of slow activation time and the fact that it hits only one foe (you'd think throwing a car would affect everyone in an area, like a cone effect or something, but alas devs aren't always the brightest I guess).

Mind control is a curious type. Telekenisis looks very interesting.

[Qwikshot]

You should try all that stuff out on the test server, it makes for making less mistakes. Right now I think Green Drake is top heavy with damage sets, so I won't pick another offensive power for a while...

Hangfire is just going to chill for a bit, last night I just needed to bring him since everyone else was on.

I like Drake's concept, he's not an alpha build (a change for once). Yeah fire is popular, but not with the super strength build. I have to concentrate more on getting healing flames, and the fitness line, but I won't grab a true travel power till later in the game, I figure Gail can tp me (THANKS GAIL).

[mtsouth]

Gail rocks. Thanks you for the tps.

I'm playing Metallmo slow and strategic, trying to find the strongest baddy and either hold or confuse him to keep him out of play while others cleanup. This works well soloing since the toughest one will usually do good damage against his pals once he's under my control. That allows me to pick off another one and/or help my new "friend" out. My next primary power will be Mass Hypnosis which puts a group of baddies to sleep until they are attacked. Not a bad opening power for a group since they can then focus attention on one or two partiuclar baddies while the others get some beauty rest. Combined with Force Fields (which can protect allies, isolate baddies, or remove them from melee range) and I'm really beginning to like the build. I can fire off four attacks in a row (confuse one target, followed by domination, levitate, then force bolt). A 4 on 1 situation can become 2 on 2 (me and confused ally) with domination making one helpless. Then it's a matter of picking apart the one my ally isn't attacking.

I'll be on tonight and this weekend....hopefully I can get to a level where I can actually contribute.

[hoopsguy]

Sounds like Metallmo will make for some new strategies for us. Good stuff. What level is he now?

[gi]

Originally Posted by mtsouth

Gail rocks. Thanks you for the tps.

I'm playing Metallmo slow and strategic, trying to find the strongest baddy and either hold or confuse him to keep him out of play while others cleanup. This works well soloing since the toughest one will usually do good damage against his pals once he's under my control. That allows me to pick off another one and/or help my new "friend" out. My next primary power will be Mass Hypnosis which puts a group of baddies to sleep until they are attacked. Not a bad opening power for a group since they can then focus attention on one or two partiuclar baddies while the others get some beauty rest. Combined with Force Fields (which can protect allies, isolate baddies, or remove them from melee range) and I'm really beginning to like the build. I can fire off four attacks in a row (confuse one target, followed by domination, levitate, then force bolt). A 4 on 1 situation can become 2 on 2 (me and confused ally) with domination making one helpless. Then it's a matter of picking apart the one my ally isn't attacking.

I'll be on tonight and this weekend....hopefully I can get to a level where I can actually contribute.

The only problem you might run into is that most of us have Area of Effect attacks that will hit all of your hypnotisted people and wake them up. FYI.

[mtsouth]

I'm level 6.
GI - we'll need to coordinate. If I need to stick to holding/stopping 1 baddie, then I'm fine with that. If it's a boos/lt/minion battle, it might be worth it to sleep the lower guys and wail on the tougher guys with direct assault and then cut loose with AoE. Then again with FFs, I should be able to hold a tough opponent until the rest of the ruffians are cleaned up and then everyone can focus on the boss.

[gi]

Originally Posted by mtsouth

I'm level 6.
GI - we'll need to coordinate. If I need to stick to holding/stopping 1 baddie, then I'm fine with that. If it's a boos/lt/minion battle, it might be worth it to sleep the lower guys and wail on the tougher guys with direct assault and then cut loose with AoE. Then again with FFs, I should be able to hold a tough opponent until the rest of the ruffians are cleaned up and then everyone can focus on the boss.

Unfortunatly I will not be the one to talk to about that...I heal and buff mostly. The blasters and spine scrappers will give you the most headaches with mobs that wake upon first attack. From what I've seen, unless you have a real disciplined team, those powers are worthless.

[Raiders Army]

Hey gi, how's thunderous blast working for you? It works great for me!

[gi]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

Hey gi, how's thunderous blast working for you? It works great for me!

I only tested it on very low level mobs. The true test will come into play when I can use it on mobs 4+ levels higher than me. You know, the ones we normally attack.


I love it though...Pretty Boy Aucoin with a big blast....scary.....

[C.J.]

No power is truely useless. You just need to get a strategy for using it. Believe me, I went through this with a number of my powers. (remember my accidental Dimension Shifts?)

As far as the mass sleep thing. It's possible to use that on mobs that are too close to each other...mass sleep the 2nd one while the team attacks the first one. Or if you need to get past a mob (maybe your mission door is right next to a group you don't want to fight). You'll come up with strategic ways to use it.

[Qwikshot]

Originally Posted by gi

Unfortunatly I will not be the one to talk to about that...I heal and buff mostly. The blasters and spine scrappers will give you the most headaches with mobs that wake upon first attack. From what I've seen, unless you have a real disciplined team, those powers are worthless.

Stupid AOE blasters with fire!