1861

It was the only blasty set I really enjoyed in beta, though I admittedly didn’t get that far with it. I feel like I’m now playing a new character that got level-bumped, which is essentially what Bitesy has become. If it all falls to pieces I’ll probably try going back to my gadgets guy.

I don’t have altitis so much as I haven’t really found a set of powers that hooked me. Force started strong but the design of the game undermines a lot of its usefulness.

1862

Sonic Device + Grenade is more situational than it appears. It’s about 100 energy, so takes some energy building for the DEX+EGO damage I get, or you have to be in Support Role (which I mostly was then), so you can’t use most passive powers.

It also only gives Big Damage if you get at least 3 foes to tightly cluster. Some PvE enemies (especially melee ones) do this routinely, others don’t. It’s generally much easier to use solo, when you can reliably draw out foes so they bunch up, but in a team it can be quite tricky, unless they simply start close enough like those Viper knuckle-heads I was Devicing. Definitely trickier to use against Gadroon.

It’s also pretty rare to pull it off in PvP, although I’ve found that if I get hurt badly and need to run, switching to Support and flying by with my Sonic Vortex Grenades gives me something to do. And it’s spectacular when it does work, for example if you get a couple of foes hold/rooting and going to town on a teammate with melee attacks, or sometimes at bottlenecks.

I wonder if you could work this angle in PvP more by yanking foes together… Find two guys kinda close, Entangling Mesh them, Yank a third in with Shuriken or Iron Lariat, then Sonic Device. Probably use a quick AoE (like a tapped Force Eruption); Grenade isn’t your best bet, as its knockback gets going before Sonic Device triggers so it’s harder to clump foes.

1863

I’m trying to do a Might/Supernatural build based around punching and the nifty chains moves; I’m using the Might energy builder, Lash, and Iron Cyclone so far (as of level 7), and am definitely picking up a defense passive (maybe Defiance or Regeneration) next level.

Is this doable, or have I already made horrible mistakes? I’ve been concentrating on Strength and Con.

1864

I think it is, although you have to be careful with holding your charge moves too long.

In the powerhouse, I was having good luck testing Mighty Leap, one Laser Sword, Pyre, Shuriken Yank, then 3 more laser swords as they stand up. I would imagine you could do something similar with Upper Cut or Haymaker. Mighty Leap, Haymaker, Iron Lariot, Uppercut, then back to a moving fight when they land?

The nice thing about the yanks is that they aren’t affected by root/hold resistance; I’m not sure how they interact with knockback resistance from Uppercut/Haymaker though.

1865

Is it worth dropping arms crafting for science crafting on an electric end/rec (then con probably) hero? science seems to be a bit better for end/rec but then arms seems to have more con.

1866

Just rerolled platinum skull, much better now – still munitions but paid attention to my selections this time. Also gave him that sonic gun energy builder that can have a cone shot, works awesome alternating between that and the shotgun – can fire as fast as I hit the keys.

1867

This game seems like a huge pain without decent defensive skills. Glass cannons really are glass cannons, but the non glass characters still have the cannon part! My munitions hero with LR and tk block just walked over situations my electric hero without either had problems with. Maybe it will be better at 17 when i get a block skill (either force or tk, it doesn’t matter to me that they’re nerfing tk shield since i’ll probably be gone by then).

Maybe i will test regen at 17 instead. I’d hate to miss the electric form graphics which look kind of nice, but regen would work as well with my stats (end/rec) and the game seems to push a defensive passive for soloing. I’d only miss out on around 40-50% improvement on base damage (as far as i know the bonus only applies to the base damage at the end of the calculation, not the modified damage) and then i could use it in groups too so it wouldn’t be a waste to have it. I spam gigabolt tap much more often than i charge it anyway.

I kind of regret taking the lightning arc/electrocute combo. On on one hand, when it comes together and you hold a master villain and zap him with a full bar of advantaged lightning arc, it does stupendousness damage. The problem comes in that every single “end quest boss” is basically immune to holds so random master villains i come across outside i can destroy with it, but “end quest bosses” don’t even notice.

1868

My elec has regen, works great so far. Going to get elec form too, but slot it in the offensive stance whatever that is called.

1869

Again, the defensive arcane circle works great with my electrical dps character. I don’t use it for normal combats, of course, but for master villains and above, where you usually have time to prepare, it’s handy. Since it’s not slotted, of course, that means I can keep electrical form in to power up gigabolt.

I tried ice tonight, but it was too slow for me. Maybe it gets good once you get a lot of crits and the higher level powers, but I don’t have the patience to get there.

1870

charged gigabolts are of course nice as for me they wipe out any henchmen i’ve tried it on (+3). they don’t seem to do much against villains and above, but i’d imagine if i had death arc, any villain+ with henchmen would die from the chain aoe. I’d imagine tap gigabolt + sonic device would do the same thing though.

I think i move around too much on my electric hero to use a circle since i’m generally trying to keep people in range of my sparkstorm. I don’t really have a set strategy for a hold immune boss (non hold immune is electrocute + lightning arc of course) at the moment. Probably just keep sparkstorm up and gigabolt tap.

Anyone know if the superconductor advantage for electrocute works even if the target is immune to holds? If it was, it might remain a boss killer ability even for the big guys.

1871

Gamespy has their review of the game up. 2/5 and “Super mediocre” sez Rory Manion.

1872

My favorite quote:

If you were one of those kids that used to mix sodas at McDonald’s, you already have an ingrained knowledge of the intricacies of Champions Online’s skill system. Sometimes, you’d stumble upon some wonderful new potion… other times, you wound up with a murky pool of rancid sewage. This is Champions’ mix-a-skill system in a nutshell, and if you find a really good concoction, the developers will patch it into murky sewage soon enough. And unfortunately, thanks to the most punishing character re-spec system ever devised (where powers must be returned in the same order they were purchased, with ever-inflating costs), mistaken skill selections are all but permanent. But hey, all the more reason to head back into that character creator, where everything is good and nothing hurts.

The reviewer is also spot on about having to do quests quite a bit above your level due to content scaling problems and the interface sometimes being unresponsive. I generally agree with almost all of the review, but i’d still likely give it a 3/5.

1873

Meh. I disagree about the skill system, it works rather well as long as you think through your power selection. The big problems with it are a lack of documentation about things like supercharacteristics determining your damage bonuses, etc. All of my characters are relatively weak, with a few skill choices here and there that aren’t optimal and so far I’ve made them work pretty well.

However, there are some skills right now that seem non-functional (Sigil of Radiant Sanctuary) and his comments about respec costs, quests, and items are spot on. I just replayed the prison instance in the desert again and they so dropped the ball not balancing that for full group play. There’s all these excellent scripting ideas (sometimes broken it seems too) and special game mechanics with power suppressors that you never really need to use because you can solo the whole thing easily. It’s begging for the WoW treatment as far as polish and group gameplay.

Edit: I love Death Panel though, what a great character and spiffy writing! Overall his review is pretty accurate though. A lot of it isn’t well thought out. But I find myself overlooking the flaws anyway because tooling around as my characters and getting the powers right. Sure Shadowfire could spec to make one shot kills, but I like that she uses darkness to hold them and rains fire from above, or that I chose other attack powers with short er, spunky, animations because she’s a teenage hero that fit well as a sidekick or on her own.

Edit 2: One thing I think they might want to consider is to have people spawn outside the instance to make travel time a penalty for dying. I was skeptical when WoW did it, but it works well, otherwise zerging is the preferred strategy sometimes in groups or you can push yourself through tough content by just respawning constantly nearby.

1874

Re-roll? No man, just respec. Ow wait, this is a Bill Roper game. You have to start over if you make a mistake or just want to change. Afterall that is what they did in Diablo 2, so it must be the way to do it in games for the next decade or two.

1875

Luckily it only takes an evening to get back to L10 or so.

1876

Cryptic has posted a State of the Game update:

State of the Game: Sept 15, 2009
Posted by Chronomancer

Greetings, Champions!

There’s a lot to cover this week, so let’s just dive right in like Armadillo tunneling his way into a bank vault.

More Content!

Monster Island has three new repeatable mission chains to help bridge our content gap there. These are unlike any of our other missions in that they’re designed as destinations you’ll revisit and will change over the course of several missions. Here’s a sneak peek!

The Hidden Base

Heroes discover the entrance to a secret base in Well’s Pass. None of their contacts know anything about the entrance so it’s up to the hero to check things out. What secret project lies deep within the VIPER base?

The Lost Caves

A series of lost caves has been discovered by the intrepid Paleontologist and television personality, Professor Plummet. His early reports have come back, stating that Elderworms have also found a way into the labyrinth of caves, and are using them as hunting grounds. Contact has been lost with the professor, and help is needed in finding him.

The Manimal Lab

A group of Manimals are behaving strangely and are guarding a nearby cave complex. Further investigation reveals a hidden laboratory that also acts as the prison for a highly intelligent rat Manimal named Professor Ratso.

We anticipate these mission chains will make their way to the Public Test Shard next week and we’ll need your help making sure they’re ready for release to the live servers.

Adding Some Meat to Team

We’re working on several new additions to the teaming system. We’re currently testing new UI that allows players to see the state of team missions even if they don’t have them. Upcoming additions (in development) include showing your team members’ current objectives on active missions and adding rewards for heroes that assist on missions, even if they don’t have the mission themselves.

Do You See What I See?

Graphics performance should be better overall for players. Some high-end users have experienced what appears to be a reduction in performance. But this is actually due to us fixing a bug where sliders that were set all the way up in certain categories weren’t actually providing that level of increase. Players with top-end graphic cards should retune their settings for maximum performance.

The Mail That Ate Sheboygan

Many fixes to our mail woes have already been pushed to the live servers, but one big one is currently on the Public Test Shard and will be pushed to the live servers ASAP. We also currently don’t have a way for players to send resources to other heroes. This is a known issue, and requires a tech solution to implement. I don’t have an ETA, but it’s on the list. We’re sorry for any inconvenience this has caused.

The Balance of Power

We’re currently making passes on all the powers in the game and will be making changes designed to not just bring aberrant powers into line, but increase the effectiveness of those that need it. We’re also examining the best ways to inject more resources into the economy. Our top concerns are what are concerning you as players. We’re working as fast as we can to address issues, work on the overall balance of the game, and be as responsive to possible. Keep hitting the forums with solid, constructive comments and we’ll keep working to make the game better and more balanced in both the PvE and PvP arenas.

Powers Aren’t Black / White – Yet…

We’re big fans of being able to shift the hue of powers into the realms of black and white. The issue is that these aren’t hues, but tints. This means that with the current way our color system works, you would see pure black or pure white colors as opposed to the grayscale subtleties required to give you the look you actually want. Basically, it requires some new engine technology, but we’re looking into how to make this happen.

Celestial Power Set

Along with some incredible events and rewards, there’s a new power set coming out with the Blood Moon event. The Celestial set is designed to provide assistance to allies and destruction to enemies. The power effects are amazing and the versatility of the set makes it both compelling as a single-focus set and also as supplementary powers to other builds. We’re going to be doing a special feature on the website in the upcoming weeks showing off the powers, so stay tuned for a detailed look.

Tutorial? We Don’t Need No Stinking Tutorial!

While it sounds simple, there are few things we had to design out to allow players to be able to skip past the tutorial if they’ve already done it once. It’s next up on the list for our content lead, and we’re hoping to have this onto the Public Test Shard as soon as next week.

Where the Duels Are(n’t)

We’ve heard your requests for our more social areas like Club Caprice and The Powerhouse to be duel-free zones. Both our content and programming teams are combining efforts to get this in as soon as possible.

A Room of Danger in the House of Power

We’re designing a new room for the Powerhouse where you can try out your powers against automated enemies. We’ll be sure to inform you when this moves to the Public Test Shard so you can help us test it out!

See you online, Champions!

1877

Wait. A Duel Free powerhouse? That’s one of the few places I actually don’t mind duel requests, so I can test out new powers. :(

1878

Don’t worry, they’re going to allow you to duel in one of the rooms of the powerhouse - just not at the entrance, where people are picking powers.

1879

I’d prefer an option to auto-decline duels, myself, like EQ2 has. But having a specific room in the powerhouse will work, too.

1880

A cooldown on duels would be nice, if someone tries to duel me and i decline, they shouldn’t be able to duel request me for a while unless i initiate it. What annoys me with duels requests in CO (and other games) is people who dual spam you.

-Nothing on fixing respeccing.
-adding test enemies in power house is nice
-trying to fix the mail system is nice. why wasn’t sending resources there in the first place? i’d think sending money would be easier to put in them sending items. Of course it doesn’t bring back my beautiful gatling gun :(
-nothing on fixing auction house
-While i like the team improvements and think team content is needed, i’m worried that they will continue the history of “encouraging teaming by nerfing soloing.”
-skipping tutorial would be nice. i’ve done it tons of times already.
-Doesn’t sound like they think being forced to do +2 to +3 missions only pretty much since 14 is a problem. Would be nice to use item rewards when i get them for once.