I had forgotten about it until I had filled out with my secondary. Although I don’t think my tanker would’ve used them anyway, as I tend to value character concept more than effectiveness.
I’m happy with the Nemesis Staff largely because it looks all clockworky, and so I can cast it without a target whenever I want to be seen to be holding something.
Oh, yeah, and it also gives me another decent ranged attack to add to my rotation, when I’m too far away to speed-punch.
I’m now up to four alts, by the way, and thinking of adding a fifth. After my gravy/time main, my next-most-played is Peskipiksi, a fey spirit who blasts with lightning and ice. So far, flight and long range are enough for keeping her very difficult to kill-- I imagine that eventually, more enemies with extreme range and/or their own flight become more common.
I’ve got a fire/fire blaster in the late teens who seems to be made of tissue paper. Like you suspect, flight and long range aren’t going to work all the time. He’s a challenge to keep alive but damn he can take out groups of enemies very quickly.
I had drop to the lowest difficulty for my electric/electric so he could solo.
So, sometimes contacts will offer a choice of missions: Usually, one is a generic “kill X number of faction Y, possibly restricted to zone Z”, while the other one is “go to such-and-such warehouse/office/lab, kill all the baddies, and find the hostages/shinies”. What are the pros and cons of picking one or the other? If I pick the “kill X of Y”, will I eventually get another chance at the office/warehouse/lab one? If I consistently pick the office/warehouse/lab one, will I run out of scripted missions early? Or should I just pick up a mix, so I can keep an eye out for the target faction while I’m on my way to mission locations?
I don’t know if it’s still viable but I always tried to combine non-restricted “kill x number of faction y” with “go to location z and take care of whatever problem(s) exist(s)” when location z is full of faction y. I’ve yet to see this opportunity to come up.
“Kill X of Y” and especially “Kill X of Y in Z minutes” tend to be one-off filler missions when offered as an option. Sometimes they will appear as part of an arc, but the flavor text will generally connect the reason for hunting the faction with a previous mission’s story (“Shake down Y for info on this thing you found out” or “Keep Y busy while I try to do something” come up pretty often.)
The door missions are more likely to lead to mission arcs or unique missions with more story, sometimes with badges attached.
I tend to avoid random hunts; there’s more than enough content without them, and I’d rather do arcs (both for story and because they give reward merits). However, if you miss arcs and badge missions, they’re available in Ouroboros.
Task Forces at 50+4 difficulty generate incredible amounts of experience. I got in on the one in Crimorea–the faux-Roman area yesterday. Started it barely over level 38, finished it just two bubbles short of level 41, and it only took a little over an hour.
OK, my blaster has four single-target ranged-attack powers that are basically interchangeable: At any given moment, I use whichever one is off cooldown. What I would want is a keybind that would always activate one of them (assuming any is available), chosen arbitrarily from those that are available. My research so far indicates that nobody knows of any way to do this, but I am undeterred: If there is a way, then I will find it, and maybe even if there isn’t.
So far, I’ve got it so my middle mouse button tries one of those four powers in succession, so the first time I click it, it tries Lightning Bolt, then the next time, it tries Blackwand, and so on. So four rapid clicks of the button will always get me something, even if three of them are on cooldown. Now all I need is a way to simulate clicking the button four times in rapid (but not quite instantaneous) succession.
I see a possibility in the 2004 Prima guide. Will try it out and report back.
Okay, slash commands can be used to fire off powers in sequence. I specifically used the /macro command for two powers but it didn’t save to a try; further experimentation is needed.
I simply use the top row of the keyboard; my most used attacks are always under 1-6, all of which can be activated in somewhat rapid fashion with my left hand.
OK, I thought I had a solution: Instead of mapping my “use next power” thing to the middle mouse button, map it to the mouse wheel, and then I could try to use all four by just scrolling the wheel down four or more clicks.
Except that I can’t seem to re-map the mouse wheel.
It’s frustrating that they made the macro system so almost-capable.
Got a chance to play bit for the first time in more than a week; Bo’s Minion is now 15.
I’ve finally got Bo’s Minion’s minions to where they are packing a real punch!
Bear in mind that I have no earthly idea how the CoX scripting engine works ; but back in my CounterStrike days I remember making a macro to create some form of “burst mode” that only let off a few bullets instead of full auto all the time ; and toggled it on/off via a single button. The “trick” I used was that one button fired the script first (which rebound mouse1 from “attack” to my “attack, wait X, stop_attack” code), then rebound the burst_mode key to the other half of the script (which rebound mouse1 to “attack”) on the fly.
So, could your macro do something like “mouse1 fire power 1 | /bind mouse1 script2” (where script2 fire power 2 | bind mouse1 script3 ; and so on), autocycling that way ?
Yeah, that’s more or less the way my macro works, but I still have to hit whatever my trigger button is multiple times. The game won’t allow you to fire off two attack powers simultaneously (if two or more would be simultaneous, the last one takes precedence), and there isn’t any sort of “wait” or “delay” command.
Hmmm. Are “if… then” checks allowed ?
Nope. If they were, it’d be a lot easier.
Meanwhile, on a completely separate note, I think that Mystic Flight (from the Sorcery power pool) might be broken-overpowered. No, not because of the Translocation thing: That’s limited to 100 yards at a time, with a long casting time, which makes it only slightly useful. But you know how it’s supposed to be possible to knock flyers out of the sky with certain abilities? Well, none of those seem to work on Mystic Flight. I’ve been floating in midair and hit by Sleep effects, and encased in ice by Lead Freezers, and so on, and I’ve always stayed airborn. I think that it still turns off if you run out of Endurance, but for an electrical blaster, that’s something that basically never happens.
Reading the complaints about certain enemy groups (been distracted with other stuff to play but living vicariously through the thread), I’m surprised no one has been complaining about Malta. No one reach that level yet? Because everyone used to hate Malta something fierce.
My main never really had a problem with Malta back in the day. Go for Sappers first, then Gunslingers.
They removed the de-toggle effect from holds and stuns around Issue 13, IIRC.
However, there are powers with a -Fly debuff that will still knock you down. Snowstorm is one, and Avalanche Shamans love it. Impale from Thorny Assault has one, which makes Silver Mantis even more annoying. Half of Earth Control seems to have it, and Earth Thorn Casters are all over CoT missions at certain levels. Several Grav powers have it (check your main’s power descriptions), and some bosses have those.
So, there are quite a few mobs out there who can ground you, even without getting into endurance-drainers like Sappers.