Issue 5: Live!

Archived from groups: alt.games.coh (More info?)

I do play, well, an earth/FF controller. The teams I played with never
ever died, not even close, unless we pushed it and went against
red/purple enemies (and many of them at the same time)
These changes were really needed to bring some excitement (i.e. danger)
to the game.
I think you're coming from the soloer crowd, then yes, I guess for
soloers it's a tough nut to swallow, but I always group with others, no
matter what hero I play. I could solo with my fire/dev blaster or my
katana/SR scrapper I guess, but it's not as fun as grouping with others.

Archived from groups: alt.games.coh (More info?)

Marc Bissonnette <dragnet@internalysis.com> wrote in
news:Xns96C36E92E61AEdragnetinternalysisc@216.196.97.131:

> Ok, maybe I'm jumping the gun (but it's nice to be first, sometimes) -
> CoH is just now patching before I can log in. (Yeah, I'm supposed to
> be working - call it a fringe benefit of being self-employed  

Yup, going live, and here is the update list:

Can be read easier at http://www.cityofheroes.com/news/updates.html

Issue #5: Forest of Dread

New Zone : Croatoa
Croatoa is a three hour train ride upstate from Paragon City , and was
once the favorite lakeside vacation spot for city dwellers. For the past
three years, the train service has been closed due to the Rikti Invasion,
but due to recent events the government have reopened the line.

* To get to Croatoa, heroes can take a train from any Green Line
station.
* Locals are asking for heroes of security levels 25 to 34 to
investigate recent strange goings on.


New Powers

* Sonic Attacks (Blaster Primary and Defender Secondary)
* Sonic Resonance (Defender Primary and Controller Secondary)
* Archery (Blaster Primary and Defender Secondary)
* Trick Arrow (Defender Primary and Controller Secondary)
* Electric Mastery (Blaster Ancillary Power Set)


Mission Customization

* Many existing missions have been updated with hostage escorts,
friendly heroes who fight by your side, waves of attacking villains and
more.


Updated Zone: The Shadow Shard

* Shadow Shard Maps show the location of each Jump Pad. A dotted line
connects the Jump Pad with its end point.
* A teleporter on Firebase Zulu takes players to any of the other
three zones in the Shadow Shard (works both ways).
* Dr. Scott Wachhorst, a prominent xenobiologist and Portal Corp.
leader, willingly purchases Enhancements from heroes in Firebase Zulu.
* A renegade Brute, Kallarn, purchases Enhancements with the hope
that he might gain enough power to overthrow Ruladak. It can be found in
the Cascades.
* Slarrah, a Wisp who has been converted by Faathim the Kind,
relieves heroes of excess Enhancements in the Chantry.
* The Nameless Mystic, an interdimensional being who feeds off the
energy kicked off by the dreaded Lanaru, happily accepts Enhancements
from heroes. Can be found lurking near the Storm Palace .


Updated Zone: Rikti Crash Site

* The military controls a teleporter in Peregrine Island that
connects to one in the entrance of the Rikti Crash Site. Heroes can go
back and forth from this point.
* Col. Barry Woodhouse works for Military Intelligence, gathering
info on the Rikti activities. heroes can sell excess Enhancements to him.


Updated Zone: Club Zero

* There are now NPCs in the Paragon Dance Party who will sell
Inspirations to heroes.


Updated Zone: Outbreak

* The tutorial has been modified.


New Badges

* In addition to new badges associated with Croatoa and the new Zone
Events, many new Achievement badges have been added for those who have
exceeded the existing ones.


Experience System Changes

* Heroes will not start receiving experience debt for defeats until
level 10.
* Defeats in missions will only result in half the usual debt.
* Experience awards for defeating level 25+ enemies have been
increased.


New Zone Events

* Steel Canyon : The Hellions are living up to their name and have
taken to arson.
* Skyway City : The Trolls are starting raves (Troll-style) when they
find a new supply of Superadine.


Game Balance

* We have made great efforts (as seen in the Powers changes below) to
make sure that the ‘conning' system for how tough your enemies are still
holds its meaning in the higher (level 25+) game. Enemies whose names
appear in red or purple should present a legitimate challenge to heroes,
both solo and in groups.
* Some heroes may find themselves having to fight things closer to
their level now, so Experience rewards have been increased for those
enemies to offset the increased difficulty of fighting higher level foes.
* Please note that you may need to vary your soloing and group
tactics to account for this increase in difficulty.


Free Respec

* All heroes will be receiving a free respec due to these balance
changes. This will be awarded 24 hours after Issue 5 is released. To use
this simply type /respec – you will be able to reselect all your
character's Powers and Enhancement slots.
* We strongly recommend that you spend some time playing with your
current character in this new version of the game before using your free
respec. You only get one free respec, so make sure that your character is
exactly how you want them before you commit – our GMs are unable to grant
additional respecs if you make a mistake.
* If in doubt, remember that you can copy your hero to the Test
server to try out the respec command and see the results before using it
on the Live servers. (See the Training Room message board for full
details of how to set up and access the Test server.)
* Free respecs do not ‘stack'. If you already have one that you have
not used, you will not receive an additional one. Free respecs are
counted separately from the respecs granted for completing the Terra
Volta trial.


Powers - General

* All Archetypes will now be able to reach their Defense cap at
sooner (was level 40, now level 20). Tankers now have a higher Defense
cap than Scrappers and Kheldians. Scrappers and Kheldians have a higher
Defense cap than all other archetypes.
o This refers to the max Defense that a character can be buffed
to. This cap increases as a character levels. Rather than waiting until
level 40, the highest cap is now reached at level 20. Tankers, Scrappers
and Kheldians now have a higher maximum Defense cap than other
Archetypes.
* Set a maximum number of targets that can be affected by most
offensive powers:
AoE Debuffs, Ranged cones, and Melee AoE (PBAoE) are set to 10.
Some Large PBAoE (like Nova) are set to 16.
Ranged AoE damage powers are set to 16.
All AoE crowd control powers are set to 16.
Melee Cones are set to 5.
Taunts (including Tanker inherent Taunt - 'PunchVoke') are set to
5.
Buffs are unaffected.
o This will limit the amount of 'herding' done by players to a
more reasonable and realistic level.
* Powers and Inspirations that resurrect will now leave the target
protected from XP Debt (duration dependent upon the power).
o Change to make these powers more useable in combat.
* Travel powers will no longer be suppressed by toggle powers.
Flyspeed of Fly, Speed Buff of Super Speed and JumpHeight/Distance buff
of Super Leap will now only suppress if you use a ‘click' attack powers
(toggles like Enervating Field and Invincibility will no longer cause
Suppression).
o The penalty was too great for players who rely on toggle
powers to protect themselves.
* Using a power that completely drains your endurance (such as Nova,
Thunderous Blast, Inferno, and so on) will now cause all toggle powers to
drop.
o These powers did not always drain 100% of endurance before,
and with the addition of Stamina or other Endurance regen buffs, it was
possible to maintain toggle powers through the endurance crash. This
change makes these powers work as described.
* Cone Enhancements removed from the game. Increased Range
Enhancements now have the same effect on Cone powers.
o The difference between Cone enhancement and Range enhancement
was confusing. Now one Enhancement works to increase the reach of all
powers.
* Inherent Powers of Archetypes (such as the Scrapper's Critical Hit
ability and the new Blaster and Controller Inherent Powers introduced in
this Issue) now appear in a character's Powers menu.
o Quality of life feature, making these powers and their
effects more obvious to new players.
* Blasters have a new Inherent Ability called Defiance . As a
Blaster's health falls, their damage begins to dramatically increase. The
lower their health, the greater the damage boost. There is a new
‘Defiance Meter' below the Endurance bar on the User Interface to show
this effect.
o Makes the Blaster into a more comic-booky Archetype to play.
As they begin to lose a battle, their power increases dramatically,
giving them the edge they need to defeat powerful foes.
* Blaster hit points increased.
o Overall increase in the survivability of Blasters.
* Blaster damage cap increased.
o Overall increase in the damage output (and thus
survivability) of Blasters. Blasters may need Buffs from other Archetypes
in order to reach the new caps.
* Controllers have a new Inherent Ability called Containment. All
Controllers will do double damage (+100% unenhanced base Damage) to a
target (non pvp) that is Immobilized, Disoriented, Slept or Held.
o Increasing the non-Pet damage potential of all Controllers.
This change is intended to give them a more balanced and even game-play
experience throughout all of their levels.
* Controller AoE Holds, Disorients and Sleeps (and a few others like
Quicksand and Ice Slick) recharge times have been increased and duration
reduced.
AoE Immobilize and Phase Shift powers were not affected.
Volcanic Gasses duration was not affected.
o Game balance change due to the new increased damage of
Controllers.
* Controller Pets, Dark Miasma/Dark Servant and Electrical
Blast/Voltaic Sentinel can no longer ‘stack'. Reusing these summon powers
before your pet has expired will remove the old pets and spawn new ones.
Illusion Control/Phantasm can still summon multiple decoys.
Fire Control/Fire Imps now always summons 3 Imps at your level.
Illusion Control/Phantom Army now always summons 3 Decoys.
o Pet powers were too strong with multiple instances out at
once. Once a Controller or Defender had pets, their play style and
balance completely changed. Pets remain a powerful tool for heroes, but
are no longer class-defining. Due to the change in the powers, we removed
the randomness in the number of pets you get with Fire Imps and Phantom
Army.
* Significantly increased duration of Controller high level pets.
They are effectively permanent until you zone, log out or are defeated.
o Quality of life change.
* Gave Animate Stone resistance to KnockBack.
o Improves the ability of the pet to tank.
* Reduced Singularity's damage resistance.
o These pets were virtually indestructible. They remain quite
tough after the change.
* Reduced Duration of Earth Control/Earthquake and Ice Control/Ice
Slick.
o Changed to bring these powers more in line with other AoE
control powers.
* Increased Recharge time of Ice Control/Shiver.
o Change to bring this power more in line with other AoE
control powers.
* Slightly decreased duration of Disorient from Gravity
Control/Wormhole, but added a chance to Disorient Bosses to be consistent
with similar powers. (Disorient duration for Wormhole is still higher
than other Controller AoE Disorient powers.)
o Change to make Wormhole more like other AE disorient powers.
* Fixed Gravity Control/Wormhole so the Disorient improves over
level, like other Controller Disorient powers.
o Bug fix.
* Animation time of Gravity Control/Crush decreased.
o Power slightly rebalanced.
* Increased the Recharge time of Radiation Emmision/Lingering
Radiation.
o Change to bring this power in line with other AoE control
powers.
* Reduced Hold Duration of Ice Blast/Freeze Ray, Ice Blast/Bitter
Freeze Ray and Electrical Blast/Tesla Cage (to bring it into line with
other non-controller single-target Hold powers).
o These hold powers were stronger than other non-controller
holds, so they were rebalanced to bring them in line.
* Scrapper damage increased for all powers.
o Our goal is to increase the overall 'Scrappery' nature of
Scrappers, making them melee combat masters, but without Tanker-level
defense. This change counters some of the general reduction in defense
that Scrappers are seeing with this update.
* Changed Regeneration/Instant Healing from a Toggle Power to a Click
power. Gave it a new animation so it activates faster.
o The power was simply too strong as a toggle that could be
kept on all the time. Rather than further increase the end cost or
decrease the healing ability of the power, we made it a click power to be
used when really needed. As a click with a long recharge, its Endurance
cost can remain low, and its Regeneration boost can stay high.
* Slightly reduced the non-enhanceable health regeneration buff of
Regeneration/Integration.
o The health regeneration component was slightly too high when
combined with the other effects of the power.
* Broadsword/Parry animation time reduced.
o Power slightly rebalanced.
* Reduced the Duration of the Fire Damage Boost for Fiery Aura/Fiery
Embrace (it is now 20 seconds. Boost to other damage types is still 10
seconds).
o Slight rebalancing of the power.
* Increased the recharge time of Fiery Aura/Burn. Decreased its
damage.
o Burn was one of the most damaging powers in the game. It is
still quite strong after the change.
* All versions of Hibernate (Tanker/Ice Armor,
Controller/Ancillary/Ice Mastery and Blaster/Ancillary/Cold Mastery) will
no longer disable your toggle powers when activated. You cannot, however,
activate new powers once Hibernate is on, and your powers will still not
affect anyone else.
Hibernate will now give you an Endurance Recovery boost.
Hibernate will automatically switch off after 30 seconds.
Hibernate will now activate instantly.
o Faster activation makes the power much more useful as a
defense. Not dropping toggles makes it more viable to turn the power off
while still in combat. Endurance boost also makes it more useful. The
duration the power can be maintained was lowered to help balance out some
of the improvements.
* Ice Armor/Frozen Armor and Ice Armor/Wet Ice will no longer accept
Damage Resistance Enhancements (This to help avoid confusion and prevent
players from Slotting Enhancements sub-optimally).
o These powers only give resistance to Fire and Cold attacks.
Many players slotted these powers for resistance, thinking that they were
getting a bonus against the same attacks the powers give Defense against.
* Slightly increased the Fire Damage Resistance of Ice Armor/Frozen
Armor and Ice Armor/PermaFrost.
o To compensate for the change to Frozen Armor and Wet Ice,
above.
* Ice Armor/Permafrost now gives resistance to Slow.
o Improvement to the power to make it more attractive.
* Ice Armor/Chilling Embrace now reduces the Damage of affected foes.
o Improvement to the power to make it more attractive.
* Fixed Ice Armor/Energy Absorption so it no longer grants less
Endurance and Slow protection if used against a higher level foe.
o This is a Bug fix. When used against a higher level foe, your
buff was lower than normal. Your Endurance Buff and Slow protection will
now always be the same, regardless of what foe you use this power on.
* Increased Super Reflexes/Evasion Defense buff.
o This will help Super Reflexes Scrappers against foes that
tend to use AoE powers, like Bosses (who typically have a higher accuracy
than minions).
* Slightly reduced end cost of the Dark Armor powers Dark Embrace,
Murky Cloud and Obsidian Shield.
o Change to help decrease Endurance problems with this power
set.
* Reduced Dark Armor/Cloak of Fear's Accuracy Debuff.
o With the previous changes to Fear effects, Cloak of Fear's
Accuracy Debuff was too powerful.
* Movement penalty removed from Storm Summoning/Steamy Mist.
Power slightly rebalanced.
* Reduced Duration on Dark Miasma/Fearsome Stare. Increased its
recharge time.
o Originally, the recharge and duration of this power were
balanced against the old Fear effect (run away). Fear is now more of a
control power and much more effective (targets are essentially Held). As
such the old recharge time and duration were too powerful for what is now
essentially a ‘control' power.
* Reduced Duration on Dark Miasma/Petrifying Gaze and increased its
recharge time. (Dark Servant version as well.)
o This power was stronger than most Controller Hold powers, and
thus too powerful for a Defender power.
* Reduced duration of Ancillary/Darkness Mastery/Petrifying Gaze to
match changes made to the Defender version.
o Change to assure that the Ancillary version of the power is
not stronger than the original version.
* Added Psionic Defense to Force Field/Dispersion Bubble.
o Improvement to the power to make it more attractive.
* Increased the recharge time and decreased the duration of
Pool/Presence/Intimidate. It only affects Lieutenants on a Critical.
o Originally, the recharge and duration of this power were
balanced against the old Fear effect (run away). Fear is now more of a
control power and much more effective (targets are essentially Held). As
such the old recharge time and duration were too powerful for what is now
essentially a ‘control' power.
* Increased the Recharge Time and decreased the Duration of
Pool/Presence/Invoke Panic.
o Originally, the recharge and duration of this power were
balanced against the old Fear effect (run away). Fear is now more of a
control power and much more effective (targets are essentially Held). As
such the old recharge time and duration were too powerful for what is now
essentially a ‘control' power.
* Pool/Medicine/Aid Self: now also grants you some resistance to
Disorient.
o Change to make this power more useful and attractive to take.
* Pool/Fitness/Health: now also grants you some resistance to Sleep.
o Change to make this power more useful and attractive to take.
* Pool/Fighting/Weave: now also grants you some resistance to
Immobilize.
o Change to make this power more useful and attractive to take.
* Pool/Leadership/Assault: now also grants some resistance to Taunt
(mostly for PvP).
o Change to make this power more useful and attractive to take.
* Pool/Leadership/Vengeance: now also grants high resistance to
Sleep, Hold, Disorient, Immobilize, Confuse, Taunt and Knockback.
o Change to make this power more useful and attractive to take.
* Pool/Concealment/Phase Shift: Although still a Toggle power, Phase
Shift will deactivate if you leave it on for more than 30 seconds.
Increased its Recharge Time.
o This power was rebalanced to limit its effectiveness in PvE
and PvP.
* Pool/Flight/Air Superiority now accepts Recharge Reduction
Enhancements.
o Bug fix.
* Added an f/x to Regeneration/Moment of Glory when it expires to
indicate your Regeneration is debuffed (this is a visual f/x change
only).
o Quality of Life feature.
* Added an f/x to Elude when it expires to indicate your Recovery is
debuffed (this is a visual f/x change only).
o Quality of Life feature.
* Fixed missing sticky f/x for Radiation Blast/Cosmic Burst Defense
Debuff (visual f/x only, no power change).
o Quality of Life feature.
* Accolade power icons changed.
o Quality of life feature.
* Fixed Kheldian Dwarf-form healing powers to heal an appropriate
amount of HP (were not healing enough).
o Powers rebalanced.
* Fixed typo in Peacebringer/Cosmic Balance.
o Bug fix.
* Fixed some help text for Empathy/Fortitude (text change only).
o Bug fix.
* Kinetics/Fulcrum Shift Icon was displaying as Kinetic Transfer.
Changed the name to the correct one in display
o Bug fix.
* Kinetics/Siphon Power Icon now displays properly.
o Bug fix.
* Removed Debuff Defense Enhancements from Spines/Impale (this power
does not debuff Defense, so Debuff Defense Enhancements were not doing
anything).
o Bug fix.
* Removed Range Enhancements from Spines/Spine Burst (this power is a
PBAoE and has no 'range' to increase, so Range Enhancements were not
doing anything).
o Bug fix.
* Scrapper/Spines: characters will no longer go through a ‘redraw'
animation between attacks.
o Bug fix.
* Fixed Warshade Stygian Circle so it no longer gives you less
Endurance when you drain an enemy that is higher level than you. Also, it
no longer accepts Accuracy Enhancements (they were unnecessary because
Stygian Circle is an auto-hit power).
o Bug fix.
* Marked Quicksand summonable to not show duplicate icon in the buff
tray.
o Bug fix.
* Fixed excessive long immobilization effect when casting or getting
hit by Transfusion, Transference, Twilight Grasp, and Howling Twilight.
o Bug fix.
* Updated Energy Blast/Power Burst help (text only, no power
changes).
o More accurately describes the power.
* Some Combat system chat message fixes for Spines powers (text only,
no power changes).
o More accurately describes what's going on.
* Fixed Hydra Travel Enhancement (Theta Exposure). It was not
boosting travel speeds enough.
o Bug fix.
* Fixed Giant Crystal Titans Travel Enhancement (Selenite Shard). It
was not boosting travel speeds enough.
o Bug fix.
* Fixed bug with minimap where ‘fog of war' would reset after
returning to a level by an elevator.
o Bug fix.


Powers – PVP

* Controller/Gravity Control/Lift now does extra damage in PvP.
o Bug fix.
* Fixed Ice Blast/Frost Breath damage in PvP (it was set too low).
o Bug fix.
* All Taunts (pool, Tanker and Scrapper) will now only be effective
50% of the time when used in PvP (not an accuracy decrease, so it cannot
be modified with enhancements).
o Taunt powers were too effective in PvP.


Powers - Global Defense Decrease
In order to facilitate a more balanced game for higher level characters
(Level 25 and up), the defensive abilities of several powersets have been
adjusted so that they are more in line with one another. Villains have
had their To Hit values reduced accordingly to work with these defensive
changes (see Powers – Villains , below).

* Reduced all Archetypes' base ability with Damage Resistance and
Defense powers.
* Reduced Defense rating of Force Field powers (Deflection Shield,
Insulation Shield and Dispersion Bubble).
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Concealment/Stealth. Defense bonus
is partially suppressed if you attack.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Flight/Hover (and Kheldian Combat
Flight).
* Reduced Damage Resistance bonus from Pool/Fighting/Tough. Increased
its Endurance Cost.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Fighting/Weave. Increased its
Endurance Cost.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Leadership/Maneuvers.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Leaping/Combat Jumping.
* Pool/Speed/Hasten no longer buffs Defense.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Frozen Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Wet Ice Defense Bonus to around 1%. Removed the
ability to slot Defense Enhancements into this power to prevent players
from inefficiently slotting this power for Defense. Enhancements that are
currently slotted into this power will continue to work until they are
outlevelled.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Glacial Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Energy Absorption Defense Bonus and set its max
number of affected targets to 14. Added an Endurance Buff to the Caster
for each affected target.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Temporary Invulnerability Damage resistance
bonus.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Resist Physical Damage resistance bonus.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Resist Elements Damage resistance bonus.
Added resistance to Toxic.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Resist Energies Damage resistance bonus.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Unyielding Damage resistance bonus.
Increased its Defense debuff.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Invincibility Defense and Accuracy bonus.
Increased its max number of affected targets to 14.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Tough Hide Defense bonus.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Rock Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Brimstone Armor Damage Resistance.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Crystal Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Mineral Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Dark Armor/Cloak of Darkness Defense bonus.
* Reduced Super Reflexes/Focused Fighting Defense bonus.
* Reduced Super Reflexes/Focused Senses Defense bonus.
* Reduced Super Reflexes/Dodge Defense bonus.
* Reduced Super Reflexes/Agile Defense bonus.
* Reduced Super Reflexes/Lucky Defense bonus.
* Reduced Dark Miasma/Shadow Fall defense bonus.
* Reduced Storm Summoning/Steamy Mist Defense Bonus.
* Set some of Illusion Control/Superior Invisibility Defense bonus to
suppress if you attack. Reduced its overall Defense bonus.
* Reduced defense bonus of Illusion Control/Group Invisibility.
* Defense of Devices/Cloaking Device is partially suppressed if you
attack.
* Increased Ancillary Pool/Force Mastery/Force of Nature recharge
time.
* Reduced Ancillary Pool/Psionic Mastery/Mind Over Body Damage
Resistance.
* Reduced Ancillary Pool/Electric Mastery/Charged Armor Damage
Resistance.
* Reduced Ancillary Pool/Munitions Mastery/Body Armor Damage
Resistance.
* Reduced Umbral Aura/Absorption Damage Resistance.
* Reduced Umbral Aura/Shadow Cloak Defense bonus.
* Reduced Luminous Aura/Incandescence damage resistance.
* Reduced Defense and Damage Resistance values of defensive Temporary
Powers appropriately based on above changes.


Powers - Villains

* Reduced Lt. base Accuracy to 57.5%.
Reduced Boss base Accuracy to 65%
Reduced Elite Boss base Accuracy.
Reduced ArchVillain base Accuracy from 90% to 75%
Reduced Giant Monster base Accuracy from 90% to 75%
Reduced Minion level Turret base Accuracy from 75% to 58%
Reduced Lieutenant level Turret base Accuracy from 94% to 65%
Reduced Boss level Turret base Accuracy from 113% to 75%
Reduced Sniper base Accuracy from 75% to 65%
Reduced Monument Minion base Accuracy from 75% to 58%
Reduced Rularuu Boss bas Accuracy from 90% to 75%
o This is to limit the severity of defensive adjustments made
to some powersets.
* There is a new low level Circle of Thorns minion, The Guardian.
o Power sets for CoT minions slightly redesigned.
* Higher level Circle of Thorns Minions should no longer repeatedly
cast the same debuffs over and over, nor should they stack them on top of
already existing Debuffs of that type.
o Bug fix.
* Some higher level Circle of Thorns minions are exhibiting new
powers.
o Power sets for CoT minions slightly redesigned.
* Banished Pantheon Summoned Husks no longer give experience when
defeated. The Death Shaman has been given a slight increase in experience
reward to offset this somewhat.
o Fix to prevent farming of Summoned Husks.
* Devouring Earth Herders should summon fewer Swarms now.
o Villain slightly rebalanced.


AI

* Fixed issue where Controller pets were not aggroing on villains
unless the villains were already attacking.
* Pets will now follow their master through elevators. Pets cannot
follow through zone or mission doors.
* Adjusted the way Confusion powers work with pets. Confused villains
will no longer attack a player pet. Confused player pets may now attack
players.
* Enemies may chase players through elevators.
* Enemy AI will now be more aware of dangerous areas, such as a Burn
patch, and will do their best to avoid them.


Tasks

* Moved spawns on many mission maps (especially Warehouse maps) to
decrease the chance of stacked spawns (two or three groups of enemies
spawning in the same place).
* All Task Forces now award badges upon completion.
* Any character above the maximum level for a Task Force will be
automatically exemplared to the maximum level of that Task Force when
they join, and will remain exemplared until they leave the Task Force.
* Eliminated the ‘Grace' level of the following task forces:
Positron, Synapse, Sister Psyche, Citadel, and Manticore. With the new
ability to Auto-Exemplar yourself to Task Forces, the ability to join the
Task Force one level after you "passed" it is no longer needed. (For
example, you used to be able to join Synapse's Task Force up until Level
21, now that you can join it at any time, you can join it after level 20
and be auto-Exemplared to level 20)


UI

* Contact names now appear a different color from other NPC names.
* There is now a new option to disable dragging powers around in the
power tray.
* Options window now allows you to specify additional texture quality
options, including Anisotropic filtering.
* Improved ‘World Detail' slider in the options window. It no longer
requires a restart of the game to apply
* Right-clicking on a character's status bars will bring up an
information window showing current totals for health, endurance,
experience and debt.
* Improved text editing on Character ID screen.
* Options menu rearranged slightly for ease of use.
* The name of the player controlling a pet now appears below the
pet's name.
* JPEG screenshots are now automatically tagged with information
regarding the location of the image and the members of your team. This is
done using IPTC headers.
* New slash commands:
/reply - replies to the last person who sent you a /tell.
/tell_last or /tl - sends a tell to the last player you sent a
/tell to.
/texAniso - sets the anisotropic filtering level.
/release_pets - unsummons all of your pets.

Game
* Players can now push aside a pet, hostage or friendly NPC that
blocks their way in a mission.



--
Marcel
http://mudbunny.blogspot.com/

Archived from groups: alt.games.coh (More info?)

"wolfing" <wolfing1@yahoo.com> wrote in
news:1125522483.462857.293860@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com:

> I do play, well, an earth/FF controller. The teams I played with
> never ever died, not even close, unless we pushed it and went against
> red/purple enemies (and many of them at the same time)
> These changes were really needed to bring some excitement (i.e.
> danger) to the game.
> I think you're coming from the soloer crowd, then yes, I guess for
> soloers it's a tough nut to swallow, but I always group with others,
> no matter what hero I play. I could solo with my fire/dev blaster or
> my katana/SR scrapper I guess, but it's not as fun as grouping with
> others.

I logged in with my 40 Earth/Empathy controller after it patched:

Played solo for a while first on heroic ('cuz apparantly all the
difficulties were reset), then on invinceable. It's a little slower with
only a single pet, though the pet now does a lot more damage, 'cuz I
replaced four of the recharge enhancements so that animate stone is now
Dam/Dam/Dam/Dam/Acc/Disorient. I didn't see the difference in
disorient at all, so I think I'll replace that with damage.

Exemplared down to 30 with the same controller and did the Ernesto Hess
TF from start to finish (I love that TF!) - There were a couple of
deaths (me being the only healer), but they were because too much aggro
was grabbed (I've done the Hess TF many, many times without a single
death).

I found that the recharge increase on Earth Quake is *very* noticeable.
Volcanic Gasses takes longer to recharge, as well. At first, I thought
the double damage for holding wasn't working, but I *think* I finally
started to see the damage numbers appearing twice for fossilize, in
rapid succession.

Tried my 24 Rifle/Dev blaster and 31 Energy/Ice blaster - not a huge
difference that I noticed, solo or grouping.

All in all, for about 5 hours of playing, the differences in I5 aren't
as nasty for controllers as I thought they would be. Glad I don't play a
tank any more though (Got a fire/fire up to 50 and was happy with that)
- The tanks in all my groups and in broadcast had several nasty comments
 

--
Marc Bissonnette
CGI / Database / Web Management Tools: http://www.internalysis.com
Looking for a new ISP? http://www.canadianisp.com

Archived from groups: alt.games.coh (More info?)

I'm still on the fence, didn't really play much on the TS.
Gotta see what my DM/SR Scrapper can do b4 I see it I put him
on the shelf. And from what they changed on my FA/EM Tanker
and them changing the burn RC Time too, gonna make it harder for me to
solo, since I like to solo than team....My ILL/Storm troller got
alittle nerf but, she's only lvl 24.....hmmmmmm.....should be an
interesting time.....


On Wed, 31 Aug 2005 09:52:05 -0500, Marc Bissonnette
<dragnet@internalysis.com> wrote:

>Ok, maybe I'm jumping the gun (but it's nice to be first, sometimes) - CoH
>is just now patching before I can log in. (Yeah, I'm supposed to be working
>- call it a fringe benefit of being self-employed