Two separate things seem to be really wrong with Enrage, any change would probably make a lot of people angry, given how prevalent it seems for builds.

Looking at a lot of builds - and a huge % of them have rage stacks built in as the 'go-to' damage increase.

You can maybe rationalize being more angry can increase your power levels for an energy attack - but a bullet/rocket/psi attack?

Maybe because it affects everything is why the Enrage power by itself is actually really weak. The Enrage effect with a high Str is really strong, but 99% of builds use other powers to boost rage other than Enrage itself.

The fact that the base duration, and the cooldown even at rank 3 give so little room to keep it stacked seems to be designed to force you to take other powers to make it work - and any power that is designed to not work well by itself seems to be a weakness. Extra ranks only shortens the recharge timer, it doesnt give extra stacks too.

I have seen many builds use Howl to refresh rage - while it adds a fear factor, and cant go above 1 stack by itself - the fact that Howl has a shorter timer than Enrage makes it almost a better power to keep rage up than Enrage itself.

Thunderclap - 6 second recharge.
Havok Stomp - no recharge timer.
Unbreakable - long recharge timer - but can get multiple stacks at the start of a fight, and combined with any other refesh method ends up giving you more rage faster than enrage + those same other powers does.

Without Defiance + Enrage, the power by itself is almost useless - taking 4-6 minutes to get to a max stack of 8 all by itself.

The fact that you can get more rage, faster, and have 8 stacks of Enraged up without even having the power Enrage seems really silly.

Unlike say Focus on martial arts builds - that require a Warrior Form to ever have more than 1 stack of Focus at a time for example...AND Focus only works on melee attacks. So it requires a form slot, and only works on one type of attacks...

The fact that Enrage affects all damage, even damage types it really shouldnt, seems to be a big factor in why it is so poor by itself. If you build around rage it is a huge bonus to damage of course.
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It seems the way it should work is more like Defiance:

-Each rank adds 1 base stack.
-A shorter base timer - shorter than the base duration of rage, so you dont need other powers, or 6 minutes, to get the power charged up.
-Getting hit should add to rage, maybe max once per 6-10 seconds say, but;
-Less other attacks should add to rage stacks, maybe refresh it, but there are 20 powers listed that can add to rage...that really seems a lot more than it should be.
-There really should be powers it doesnt add damage to...as pretty much any other power that adds to all damage requires a passive slot of some type, or is a 12 second out of every 90 second short term buff.

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It is probably a touchy issue being as it gets mentioned all the time as so useful to so many builds, but the fact that it seems useful to so many builds seem to be an issue - along with the power that is supposed to grant Enrage itself being really meh.

Not angry at proposed changes to enrage, I understand what you're trying to say, just disappointed by the lack of fact checking. Where did 99% come from and how do you account for the large quantity of players who find Enrage, the power, very useful despite not having defiance? Also did you consider that Enrage becomes laughably easy to maintain with only a smattering of CON, INT, or a mix of both?

The cooldown is set the way it is so that you have options in choosing how you wish to permanently maintain enrage. Add advantage points to it if you don't want to boost CON/INT as much, remove points if you're doing the opposite. Enrage, the power, isn't weak.

There has been a sensible suggestion that crops up from time to time, and that is to make enrage a toggle while at the same time removing the redundant aggressor toggle. The reason why this makes sense is because at launch, Enrage was designed not to be up permanently if you weren't constantly maintaining it during combat, but during the might pass, it was made into a power you could maintain even out of combat. If you can maintain it out of combat, and there are a multitude of ways you can do it, it may as well just be a toggle.

I like Enrage the way it is. Its boosts any damage, perfect for hybrid builds (damage and/or melee+ranged), but needs a dedicated build to keep Enrage stacks up and running.

No idea how others do it, but for me, just as I get max number of Enrage stacks, theres some cinematic cut scene that can't be canceled so I can hit Enrage/Howl button or lag spike or bad guys are dead anyway. Plus when leveling your CON/INT may not be high enough yet to keep Enrage up. Or your STR is kinda meh so it's not even worth it. It ain't as great as some say it is :/

Plus I play PvE. Don't really care how big others e-thingie is. Its why I left games like DDO.

Oh, about "boosts any damage even bullets". Enrage has a wrong name. Name suggest hulk/barbarian/dark side and stuff. If you'd rename Enrage into, lets say Oomph, it would be better :)

IMO, Aggressor should be the primary damage boost for Bricks, and if Enrage is to continue to exist, it needs to be a toggle that gives less benefit than toggles that increase specific damage types. After all, this is a universal damage buff -- other such effects pay heavily for affecting all damage types (looking at you Ebon Aura).

but but but...we can't make it like AoED...we want more than 3 people (myself included amongst AoED users) to actually use Enrage. :D

I like AoED. My first character to hit 40 had it, and I keep at least thinking about using it in other builds.

When playing that character, I had a few people ask me how to get that cool glowing hands aura. When I told them it was Aura of Ebon Destruction, they asked me what it dropped from or if it was a craftable item. :sigh:

And I hate maintaining Enrage stacks, and so I don't bother.

But I realize also that I'm kind of a weirdo.

LOL, that is just an awesome story! Thanks for sharing. I have to go tell my cousin (who brought me to CO in the first place) this one. He's going to flip. LOL :D

Tried it once with a ranged char .. after running like a madman through a dungeon without seeing really
what sourrounded me, since i was just staring on the enrage button, i finally was before the boss room,
and bang .. cuscene .. enrage gone.

Never bothered again with it, and never ever will.

I think the design intention is for a reliable Enrage brick/tank to have Defiance, run in with Unbreakable, get hit long enough to build up say 4 rage stacks, simultaneously building Defiance stacks, pop Enrage once you get to 8 and boom - 15 seconds to full rage say. But then Unbreakable is not in the Might powerset, but is in Power armor so the rage thing makes no sense at all really (well the power without the advantage makes sense in there, but a power armor advantage that pops enrage makes no sense)

The problem as pointed out is that unless you have something really specific - those cut scenes drop anything you had going already, and Enrage by itself isnt going to do you any good for the big fight.

Unless you just stand there at the edge of the room for several minutes hitting Enrage every timer which is lame and silly if that is the intention of the power.

But if you build for it - again taking Unbreakable, and Enrage, and one other power that adds/refreshes it - any build ranged, psi, power armor, magic..anything that doesnt use focus basically - can get rage almost as easily and have Enraged Force Cascade, Enraged Lightning Storm, Enraged Minigun...

It seems really awkward and doesnt really make a lot of sense.

I have no problems with enrage as a brick char .. who has the attaks to build it up, but enrage as a ranged
only came up with AoPM i think .. and for me i would rather see that go away and make it just a Melee toggle
and rather give all ranged sets also their own toggle instead of trying to hassle with enraged.

Don't know .. but for me enraged as ranged, just for the damage, is just totally unfun to play.