[Weekly Discussion 80: More Hard Mode or New Zones & Missions?]

If the "vs." part is a matter of dev focus, I'd definitely agree new content is the way to go.

 

The first and easiest method would be, as someone previously suggested; adding more tip missions. The reason is simple; they're individual elements of repeatable content that don't need to be connected to anything other than the present tip system; i.e. no new contacts, no changes to any zones, only a few paragraphs of text each. That means they can be implemented piecemeal without necessarily needing a whole issue/page to add them.

 

As suggested, they don't even need to offer a moral choice (one could argue that accepting or dismissing the tip would be the moral choice), just be new content.

 

Related to this, I also agree with the idea of decoupling radio mission locations from level and, perhaps with that, expanding the level ranges for certain groups... or at least having logical transitions (ex. running the Midnighter missions at lower levels gets you Lost and specific Rikti bosses while at higher levels they're all Rikti).

 

The second thing I'd like to see in this regard is, especially blue-side, is Zone Revamps and Consolidation. When the snap hit, I ended up trying several alternatives, but the one I really want to mention here is "Vanilla SWTOR." A LOT of the older zones in City of Heroes lack much character and are, by and large, empty. Mission doors are randomly assigned and sometimes don't even have specific zones they have to be in. By contrast; every last corner of each world in the initial 1-50 SWTOR had a purpose related to one of the missions in the game. If there was a mission that required you to hunt 10 of X, by golly there was a specific region of the map where those things spawned in regularly. If the mission called for you to go to a specific generator and repair it, there was a specific generator in a specific part of the map you had to go to. In CoH that sort of design is really only present in the revised Atlas/Mercy intro arcs and, to a lesser extent, parts of Praetoria.

 

What I'd like to see is mission content created or modified to be like that. Lock the missions of the old story arcs to specific doors in the same zone as the contact unless it absolutely needs to be in another zone. Add specific locations for the mobs needed for mission completions to spawn. For example, "Defeat X Carnies" in CoH is a pain in the butt because they only spawn on Peregrine Island at night... and the random number generator is just as likely to drop Malta or Rikti or Nemesis onto a given spawn point. Having a specific section of the map where it ALWAYS spawns Carnies (or Nemesis or Malta or Rikti) would make those missions a LOT smoother.

 

Related to this is the idea of Consolidation. I've suggested this before, but I think the game could benefit from blowing Skyway off the map the same way Galaxy City was (link it to the Admiral Sutter TF) and all of the zone events and contacts there moved to Steel Canyon (and Steel getting a face-lift by replacing many of the buildings with the newer ones from Praetoria... of which there are hundreds to choose from) to make it a more modern and active zone (adding a great monster and Troll raves/Supa-Trolls in addition to the existing fire event). Because seriously, other than ground access to Faultline and Bloody Bay, the Synapse TF and roads to nowhere WHAT is there that actually makes Skyway worth visiting that couldn't be done just as well by adding a Tram in Faultline and dropping Synapse and the Bloody Bay chopper in Steel Canyon (perhaps moving Positron and the bulk of the Posi 1 mission doors to Faultline, where the bulk of the Posi 2 TF also occurs)?

 

Repeat this one zone pair at a time and decide for each just what the purpose of each Zone is other than just filling up space and creating the illusion of choice in advancement (i.e. you can get the contact from Steel who gives you a set of missions or the contact from Skyway who gives you the exact same set of missions... or at least did back in the old days). For example... What is the purpose of Independence Port that can't be accomplished by the docks of Talos Island? Now maybe both DO serve a purpose, but maybe they don't.

 

For me, Talos is a convenient mid-level hub because you've got a trainer, base portal and merit vendor all right next to a Tram, but it has a ton of dead space you only fly past on your way to mission doors. The only reason to hit IP outside of a specific mission is the level 30 Icon mission, the Yin TF, the starting phases of a Terra Volta respec trial and Lusca. The giant Golden Gate-ish bridge is also visually appealing, but there's a whole lot of just dead space there that feels like it needs MORE; like "you could chop the far north and everything south of the Terra Volta entrance off and make villain zones out of them and 90% of Blue players would never notice they were missing" empty.

 

That would be my focus way more than adding new zones; Fill in the existing ones.

 

You could even make a contest out of it by having "Write an Independence Port focused AE story arc and the top X (as judged by the devs) will become new story arcs for the zone."

[Weekly Discussion 78: Incarnate Powers - a review of ultimate power!]

9 hours ago, Darmian said:

Might get flamed on this one!  If Incarnates could only be used in level 50 content then lock things like the ITF to a 49 cap. Seriously, a kitted out 49 is damn tough.

Instead of locking Incarnates to level 50 content, I’d suggest it instead be limited to level 51 content (i.e. content run at level 50 with the difficulty turned to at least +1 for level 51-52 enemies). Maybe it even needs to be higher than that, but the idea is that doing so provides a simple and deliberate toggle to allow or disallow incarnate abilities by the mission leader just setting the difficulty at a certain level.

 

And again, the two things I keep coming back to are;

 

A) You could already build Superman or Thor (selected because they’re basically the strongest of the mainline heroes in their respective universes) before there was ever an Incarnate system.

 

B) The Incarnate system wasn’t added to improve the health of the game... it was added to obviate the 1-50 game with unbalancing abilities in order to promote a monetizeable endgame grind to appease NCSoft.

 

It doesn’t matter how much you might like the Incarnate system; I loved my 80’ electronet arrows and they were nowhere near as disruptive as incarnate powers yet still got nerfed for what the devs believe is the good of the game.

 

For the health of the overall game Incarnate powers really need to be reigned in.

 

One obvious and simple fix would be that the Alpha Slot level shift should be made into an Incarnate Shift (i.e. only functions in incarnate content like the other two).

 

As a fix that still offers something to those who like the Incarnate powers, add a difficulty option to the game for turning on/off Incarnate powers. Turning it on not only allows incarnate powers and level shifts to be used, but adds level shifts to all opponents (I’d base it on difficulty... +1 level shift per +1 difficulty... so at +4 the opponents would also have +4 level shifts applied) and drops special “aspect” opponents into the missions (like quantums, but for Incarnates).

 

In trade... allow incarnate powers to function all the way down to level 1 even when exemplared as long as the difficulty option for incarnates is toggled on. This then opens up ALL the old content for Incarnate Oroboros teams to challenge themselves against.

[Weekly Discussion 78: Incarnate Powers - a review of ultimate power!]

1 hour ago, Kazuuk said:

It was just merely a reminder to not to take extremist opinions like yours seriously. 

Check my previous post in this thread... that was my moderate position, but since you're claiming we should all be ignored I figured I'd just drop my real, non-moderated, thoughts on incarnates.

 

To sum up my feelings... Incarnates were bad design (and a poor fit for a game where you could already easily build Superman or Thor as a normal level 50 character; no incarnate powers needed) foisted on Paragon Studios by NCSoft insisting that the game have a Korean MMO-style endgame grindfest they could monetize. It was deliberately unbalanced relative to the 1-50 game for the same reason the BIS raid gear in other MMOs is OP... to get people to view the 1-50 game the same way it is in virtually every other MMO; as the speedbump to the real game where endless grinding for random gear drops is the only way to advance, and then every so often once enough are close enough to the top tier, they drop a new raid and level of gear with all new grinding for the next tier of unbalanced gear to obtain. Rince, repeat, collect paychecks.

 

Frankly, the ONLY reason Incarnate powers are seen as a normal part of the game here is because of the decision to incorporate incarnate XP, threads and emp merits into veteran levels and general content. If it was still behind the usual Incarnate Trial grindfest (or Dark Astoria for a trivial amount of incarnate rewards) it'd be as niche as PVP is. MAYBE people grind for the Alpha, but the rest would be a small amount of diehards too busy working for their t4s on the iTrials to influence the way the level 45-50 game is played (i.e. most people with Judgement would be running iTrials for the xp/threads/components they need to upgrade that and unlock the higher tier powers and not Peregrine Island radio missions).

 

We are free of the need for the monetized grind and, with it, the need for brokenly OP powers that existed only to be monetized.

 

My honest opinion... take the brief outrage lumps and do what's actually good for the long term health of the game by either removing or completely siloing (as PVP is siloed) the Incarnate system*. This will make it infinitely easier to develop new content, particularly stories that need to be level 50 to make sense.

 

* If the system is removed, re-balance the story/mission content for normal level 50s (I've similarly long suggested that the Incarnate Trials be reworked into a story arc/taskforce format handed out at level 45-50... one of the problems with gating major story elements behind massive trials is its can be hard to stop and read the flavor text when everyone's hellbent on getting through the trial ASAP).

[Weekly Discussion 78: Incarnate Powers - a review of ultimate power!]

20 hours ago, Kazuuk said:

I would STRONGLY urge the devs to consider that the opinion of this thread does not match the in game community at all.  Keep in mind, only a statistically insignificant portion of the player base even reads here, let alone posts.

Then we should also point out that only a statistically insignificant portion of the playerbase is even running Incarnates at a given time (seriously, compare the total number of toons to the number of level 50 toons and also that not every 50 is incarnated and even those that are aren’t universally equipped with t4s or even have all their slots unlocked).

 

Why should we consider what this insignificant minority wants when it’s harming the game experience overall?

 

In this latest issue they nerfed the hell out of Titan Weapons and Tactical Arrow because they felt they were unbalancing everything regardless of how many argued that keeping an 80’ range on a power wouldn’t break the game.

 

If an extra 20’ range on a t1 power is unbalancing enough to get a nerf regardless of user sentiment then WHY THE HECK shouldn’t the single most unbalancing set of mechanics in the game NOT get a serious balance pass and wide array of nerfs?

 

Because you happen to like it and are trying to deflect the sentiments that the incarnate powers need to be looked at by claiming its not actually representative?

 

Nice try, but no.

 

My first choice would be to actually cull the entire incarnate system from the game and retool the Incarnate content that does exist to account for this (remove the level shifts from the opponents for example, since players won’t have them either). At best, keep the Alpha Slot only (sans level shift) as a level 50 capstone.*

 

My second choice would be to limit them exclusively to Incarnate content and level 50 content where an “Incarnate” difficulty toggle has been activated (and which adds level shifts and other boosts to all opponents in the missions).

 

My third choice would be to allow only one Incarnate power to be active at a time (with a 5 minute timer on changing which is active) outside of Incarnate content.

 

But those are my personal preferences. Frankly, I think the best thing that ever happened to City of Heroes was it being shut down before the grindy Endgame system could be fully implemented so that, for the most part, the focus of the game remains on all the content you experience on the climb to 50 rather than solely on a handful of endgame raids and the notion that 1-50 are just the dues you pay to get to the real game (note how many MMOs with that mindset have monetized bypassing the original content precisely because all their focus has been on the endless grind of max level and upping the level cap to start it all over again).

 

My main interest in rebalancing/nerfing Incarnate powers is that their existence makes creating a full range of content nearly impossible for the current small volunteer dev team (one of the reasons I believe their new mission content has been primarily in the 15-35 level range... no incarnates and, pre-level 27 not even much IO-set slotting to speak of).

 

Basically, I think incarnate content takes way too much work (there’s too great a disparity between a fresh 50 and a fully t4’d level 50 to figure out a sweet spot on difficulty) so I’d favor any changes needed to make new mission content in the level 45-50 range easier to develop.

 

* I do think some of the Incarnate powers could be repurposed by rebalancing them and making them into a new Patron Power Pool (the original mission arc you used to unlock the Alpha slot becoming the Patron unlock mission for the Incarnate patron) where the five power picks are retooled Judgement, Interface, Destiny, Lore and Hybrid powers (rescaled to normal ancillary pool values) complete with slotting options.

[Weekly Discussion 78: Incarnate Powers - a review of ultimate power!]

I'd like to see a general assessment of how feasible adding new Incarnate content actually is given the size of the development team. I feel there's a reason they've been mostly creating new mid-level story content and that reason is that its the most robust part of the game... no Incarnate Powers and a lot of the good IO sets can't even be slotted until level 27.

 

And if the answer is that the likelihood of new Incarnate content is extremely limited then I'd like the devs to consider making the harder choice than just leaving it as is, and, like PVP, consider the incarnate tree complete (as in sufficient to complete all existing incarnate content) and then curtail its effects on other areas of the game; particularly the 45-50 game where you basically can't build mission content now without accounting for all the incarnate powers that be thrown around to trivialize it.

 

If I had my druthers, I'd have Incarnate Powers only function in Incarnate specific content AND level 50 missions/TFs with the difficulty set to at least +1 (putting it on par with the Alpha Slot level shift). Alternately make it a toggle on the difficulty system where you get some sort of bonus rewards if incarnate powers are turned off (and are running content at a level you could normally use them... nothing extra for toggling it on for a Posi for example).

 

Alternately, if I wanted SOME incarnate use outside of those areas I'd want to look at something like only being able to use one incarnate power at a time; say a check box with a five minute timer or similar so if you wanted Judgement, you could have it, but you'd need five minutes before you could swap it and use Lore or Destiny, etc. This wouldn't apply inside Incarnate Content, but would when you're say, running Peregrine Island radio missions against the Council.

 

Another option would be to use the old "Kheldian Detector" tech and add some incarnate tier enemies to each of the level 45+ groups who would spawn on missions where slotted incarnate powers are detected (basically whatever the trigger is that level shifts you down for Apex if you don't have Incarnate powers slotted).

 

For example; The New Praetorians arc involved the Council teaming up with Scott's faction and getting access to several bits of Praetorian tech... so if the Incarnate detection is triggered you start getting Council re-colored IDF units mixed into the Council Forces (I'd honestly like to see that pushed to the level 51+ Council in general... re-colored IDF troops replace the infantry, Orbs replace the hoverbots, WarWorks replace the bots, Nictus Dwarves and Novas replace the Galaxies... phase out the war wolves and vampyri to reflect the defections back to the 5th Column).

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

30 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

You would have to make a convincing argument for why that’s necessary.

How about... "the changes makes it a real pain in the butt to exemplar down so you'll get less people doing it"?

 

If you devote resources, as Captain Powerhouse said was the reason why they made it 60' with the intention that you could slot for range to get it up to 80', then having those resources fail in one of the more common situations; exemping down via teaming or Oroboros to do content is bad design... particularly when you have to eyeball your range and can't rely on having a consistent range to use as a guide.

 

At level 32+ with 2 SO's (+50% range) its 90' vs. your archery attacks' 80', at level 15 its only 71' (+19% range) vs. your archery attacks 80'.

 

So depending on your exemplared level your ENA and Ice Arrow go either 10' further (level 32+) or 10' shorter (level 15) so you can't get used to any one set of ranges. It is VERY disruptive to try and play this way so the solution is obvious... just don't exemplar at all. Those calls for more players to run a Posi? Ignore them. Don't bother doing missions you missed on the way up in Oroboros... run more PI radio missions where exemping isn't an issue.

 

Again... there's a bunch of people on this thread voicing that they have very real problems with this change. We're looking for some type of compromise and ALL you do is shoot down every attempt to find some way to maybe live with the changes without just shelving whole toons out of frustration with "my way or the highway" type responses.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

1 hour ago, josh1622 said:

You have way more slots when you exemp.  It would make you way more powerful than a lowbie with a few slots and full value SOs.  Not saying it couldn't be done but I can see why they would leave in scaling.

You have SOME more slots, but not nearly all of them.

 

Let's take Posi as the most common thing to exemplar down for... the level cap is 15 which means a scaled down character will have their level 16, 18 and 20 powers and has an exemplar scalar of 0.391.

 

An actual level 15 will have nine primary/secondary/pool powers and a total of 14 extra slots. Those are probably all in attacks so two attacks with six slots, one with 5 slots... slotted with level 15 SOs those powers will have a total enhancement of +200% (+33.3 x 6) in the two, 166.6% in the third and all other powers (health, stamina, combat jumping, etc.) slotted at +33% each (or +25% depending on the enhancement type).

 

The exemplared character can have a total of +78% on any one power (if six-slotted) so even with all three extra powers (16, 18, 20) six-slotted (which they may not be... a lot of movement and utility powers tend to fall in that band) that's only a total of 234% (78% x 3) worth of enhancement bonuses... while their other powers are also cut to at most 78% each and anything single slotted (ex. Stamina) having its enhancement bonus dropped to just +12% or less).

 

And double slotting for range instead of the usual suspects means you're not even going to have the normal six slots worth of bonuses to acc/damage/etc. With the exemplar scaling those two Range SO's Captain Powerhouse mentioned aren't even worth a DO in terms of effect and you'll far short of 80' despite literally a third of the slots in the power being devoted to fixing this range nerf... because exemplar scaling simply can't account for slotting priority (i.e. a level 3 blaster can double slot their ENA with two range SOs and get past 80'... a level 33 blaster can't get to 80' when exemplared down even if they used all six slots for Range SOs).

 

A simple way to fix this is to remove certain enhancement types that are used more to "fix" than to "boost" from the exemplar scaling effects.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

13 hours ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

I saw these suggestions. Many will obviously disagree, given the feedback, but I dont want to nerf the immob or damage to accommodate a return to the higher range. If a player wants to prioritize range over damage or immob, then they can do this themselves by slotting that way. The boost to 60ft was precisely so that enhancements had an easier and more realistic chance to get a player to the 80ft mark. 2 even level SOs (now a standard at all level ranges) can get any of these powers past the 80ft mark.

Unless you're exemplaring down... as I mentioned both here and in the thread on Enhancement changes. Exemplaring below 32 starts the inevitable decay of your enhancement performance until two even level SO's net about a DO's worth of effect on a PosiTF. Even 6 slotting for Range (with more than half of it wasted by diminishing returns) won't get you to 80' if you're exemplared.

 

If this is the tact you're taking, may I suggest removing SOME of the enhancement types from the Exemplar scaling... scaling down Acc, Damage and the like makes sense... but Range is SO niche that anyone using it is almost certainly doing so to address a specific issue in their build to the detriment of the "more useful enhancements" and not being able to slot full sets into their powers. Having that fail (when it worked when you actually WERE level 15 using level 15 SO's) just because you're exemplaring removes a lot of the incentive to exemplar at all... why help that level 15 when you can run a level 35 mission without your range workaround being wrecked by the exemplar mechanics?

 

So there's my counter proposal if this is your hard line... remove RANGE (and perhaps some of the other edge-case enhancements like Interrupt Time) from the Exemplar scaling formulas.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

2 hours ago, Wavicle said:

That is 100% a player issue. You have the tools (moving closer) to deal with the problem.

First, the lack of a range counter makes that trickier than you intimate. Again, the issue is that unless you always open with the shorter range powers, you have to GUESS whether everything is in range or not before you start and if you're wrong... "DERP!" goes the 'not in range' sound effect as soon as you hit that part of your attack chain.

 

Second, you're basically telling a whole group of people "you're playing it wrong" because it doesn't personally affect you... while at least a dozen players in this thread alone have said it will wreck their play experience.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

5 hours ago, Zepp said:

5 Bombardment 2-slot + 2 Superior Blaster's Wrath 3-slot = +45% range = 87 range. Add Artillery & Positron Range boosts and you have solid distance on your AoE damage attacks.

As has been addressed previously this...

 

A) makes the disparity in ranges WORSE not better because all those improvements are affecting all the powers based on their base ranges... so now your 80’ foot attacks have a 116’ range or almost 30’ difference instead of 20’.

 

The Issue isn’t so much the range as it is the range differrential that throws off the smooth operation with the set as it’s been used. Frankly, it’d be easier to deal with Archery also being nerfed to 60’ to match ranges than leave them as they are.

 

B) Falls apart as soon as you start exemplaring below about level 27 where those sets can be slotted. Similarly, slotting for range to compensate falls apart when exemplaring because of how the scaling works.

 

At this point a level 7 Tac Arrow player with a level 5 Range SO will outperform the an exemplared 50 with two 50+5 Range IOs slotted. When I brought this up in the Enhancement changes thread I was told to basically stop whining despite the way the scaling works makes even the means to work around the changes (by replacing set IOs with generic range IOs) useless.

 

If you like your range, you can’t exemplar below about level 29 without it starting to degrade immensely, even if at level 15 you had two range SOs in ENA... now you’ll have about a DO worth of range improvement.

 

Basically, nothing has been done to address it, and every attempt to find some way to get the problems addressed is shot down as unimportant. Forgive those of us who were very invested in a particular playstyle having it seriously disrupted being a little salty given that there’s been basically zero feedback from the devs on the issue and dismissive remarks from a relatively few but loud other posters (seriously... take a look at the likes and thanks on the “this is a problem” comments versus the “this is fine” comments... “this is fine” is loud, but aren’t getting nearly the agreement that “this is a problem” are getting.

 

 

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

50 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

It still works fine as a purely ranged secondary.

Accept that other people disagree with this assessment and that how a set feels is a very subjective thing and what isn't a big deal for you might be crippling to others.

 

For example, I literally cannot play using WASD to steer... I grew up on old-time FPS games like Doom and Dark Forces so the W and A not being in perfect alignment makes it horrendously uncomfortable so to this day I steer with the directional arrows. This means every time I need the mouse I have to leave the arrow keys to grab the mouse. That makes any location based power a non-starter (target_location helps, but location AoE's are often smaller than target-based one so it's less effective)... sidebar; this is why I LOVE the new /interact command since I'll no longer need the mouse for doors or glowies.

 

If you REALLY want me to accept a 60' range, I need a range-finder like most newer MMO's have so I can judge a proper starting distance without the need to always open with ENA or risk part of my attack chain getting the "derp" sound from not being in range.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

45 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

Tac Arrow was OP compared to other Blasters secondaries. That is why it got nerfed. The rebalanced version of it performs similarly to other Blasters.

But the main reason people took Tac Arrow was precisely because it wasn't like all the other secondaries. Specifically because it worked well as a purely ranged secondary.

 

NONE of the people saying they aren't happy with the range nerfs in Tac Arrow have said they don't accept the need for nerfs to the set or even to those particular powers; they're simply asking that the nerfs be to other areas of the powers to bring them into line.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

1 hour ago, ForeverLaxx said:

Factually incorrect. Some fit this formula, some are actually better DPA than certain Primary Blast T1s, and some are comparable if a tad lower. You clearly don't know what you're talking about, so why are you on a warpath to see all these (except Psi, for some reason) get locked to 60 feet? Because the devs made the change and you defer to their "wisdom"?

Because some people think the same mindset that gave us 4E D&D (an edition maligned for its sameness and focus on adherence to theorycrafted rules rather than how it worked when used by actual players and became the shortest running edition in history as a result) will somehow produce good results here.

 

There are plenty of ways to limit the utility of the tier 1 that don’t require the use of a cookie-cutter and straight-jacket. As mentioned; halve the duration of the immobilize. Reduce its magnitude so you have to stack it. Make it a -speed debuff.

 

We’ve already thrown out the cottage rule on these secondary revamps... the moment this goes live I’ll have an Oil Slick Arrow slotted with Luck of the Gambler and a Kismet (global +tohit).

 

Frankly, these changes feel like the exact same mindset that happened to SWTOR (still limping along on the backs of casino pack whales) where they stripped out everything unique about each class and replaced it with cosmetically different but identical under the hood options so that every tank, healer, burst dps and DoT dps spec played exactly the same as those from every other class.

 

Sure it made the PVP (that almost no one plays) easier to balance, but it robbed the classes of anything unique (made worse by the storyline pushing everyone onto the same story path whether they’re a Darth Vader or a Lando Calrissian).

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

2 hours ago, Wavicle said:

Right, which you’re only supposed to be able to do at 60 ft.

Why are we only supposed to be able to do it at 60'? What is the objective criteria that says "this far and no further?" other than because that's how it was done before?

 

A lot of these secondary changes are already changing how things were before... as a previous poster put it, "change for the sake of change."

 

Heck, they've already upped all the immobilize ranges to 60' from the old 50'... so we're really just arguing over the extent of the changes rather than whether there are going to be changes to those prior standards.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

2 hours ago, Wavicle said:

I wonder if the Blaster Glue Arrow should be made Location based like the Trick Arrow version?

Please God, no. The set's already been gutted enough. The primary joy of the set is that it doesn't have any location based powers muddying up the steady targeting (and is one of the reasons many who like the set as is, really aren't that into Oil Slick Arrow).

 

Also, the reason the electronet arrow needs to be 80' has nothing to do with the immobilize; most Tac Arrow players don't even slot it for immobilize; they slot it for damage due to the fact that it's energy damage (a type that is resisted by things that resist lethal damage) and so is often a part of the default rotation for Archery/Tac Arrow blasters. Reducing the range makes it harder to use as part of that rotation. Frankly, you could probably even replace the immobilize with a stackable slow and you'd still have Archery/Tac Arrow players employing it in their rotation as long as it was 80' and kept the energy damage over time.

 

This is also why I feel reducing the duration instead of range would be a much better option for providing more build options. Right now the duration is MORE than long enough to keep a target locked down for an entire fight with no need to slot for immobilize... which is why its so easy to slot it for damage. Cut the duration in half though and now there's a meaningful choice between slotting for damage (but needing to reapply it to the same target during the fight to keep them locked down) or for immobilize (to make it last long enough to immobilize for the entire fight duration).

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

4 hours ago, Jimmy said:

Cool it guys. I don't want to perform thread surgery!

I agree.

 

One thing that can definitely be taken from the reactions though is that, at least for the Tac Arrow players, these range changes are definitely a passionate issue. I think that should also be considered when it comes to changes to the set and that perhaps nerfs to areas other than the range in ENA and Ice Arrow might be a way to tune the set that won't spike emotions quite so much.

 

Is there any way we could try ENA with range 80' but say halve the immobilize duration and/or reduce the mag to 2" (or whatever you feel is a fair trade-off for keeping the 80' range) and something similar for ice arrow in one of these page builds? Just to see how its received relative to the current range reductions?

 

Maybe we're wrong about how disruptive the trade-offs to keep the range at 80' would be to our playstyle (just in a different way)... but it'd be really nice to feel that for ourselves, because there's a lot of passion behind the 80' range and where there's passion, logical arguments are less effective than letting us actually feel what those trade-offs to keep the range would be.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

7 hours ago, Arcadio said:

You get free accuracy in the sustain. There's kb protection, +rech, and +def in a toggle. Basically a second nuke in OSA. And again, everything can be used at range. Is there a reason it needs a range buff as well? Is it underperforming?

First LOL at the blaster OSA being considered anything other than garbage tier. Just previously I had to actually explain to someone because they were stunned no one was taking it. Short version, you have to cannibalize your existing build to slot it and at one slot it’s garbage... especially for a level 38+ power pick when ancillaries open up at 35.

 

To the point; Yes, actually... the reduced range completely disrupts the current playstyle of the set so much that those who play it would accept additional reduced magnitudes and halving the duration of the immobilize/hold in order to keep the 80’ range.

 

A big part of the problem is that, unlike newer MMOs, we don’t have a range indicator. We have to guess when we’re in range. When everything has the same range you can open with whichever power makes the most sense for the situation and just nudge closer until it activates.

 

But unless you want to open with ENA or Ice you have to guess whether you’re in range for them or not when you do your opening attack... and because both are part of people’s regular attack chains it can lead to situations where your first shot goes off and then the “derp” sound because your second shot isn’t in range... completely disrupting your rhythm.

 

The related problem is that, because of how enhancements scale when exemping, you can’t achieve a consistent range fix using enhancement slotting. You can only be assured of the fix at level 32+. So again, very disruptive because you can’t just see the range to a target, you have to eyeball it and exemping will change the ratios (to the point that enhancement slotting to get you back to 80’ at level 32, goes to just 66’ at level 15). Similarly, because it scales off the base range, set bonuses to range actually make the difference in range WORSE rather than reduce the problem.

 

The whole range thing is an utter mess for existing Tac Arrow players. 90% chance I’ll just shelve mine rather than deal with the frustration.

 

Again... all the Tac Arrow players posting here have said they would accept significant additional nerfs in other areas... reduce the base accuracy, halve the mez duration. Make the net arrow a mag 2 so you need to hit LTs twice just to immobilize them... just leave our range for ENA and Ice Arrow at 80’.

 

Its clear from your comments you don’t actually play the set... so take it from the actual users of the set that we would find half duration or mag 2 to be LESS disruptive to our playstyle than dropping the range from its current 80’ to 60’.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

3 hours ago, Wavicle said:

Tac Arrow's shtick is that it's a Blaster version of Trick Arrow.

That’s not what I mean by shtick... that’s fluff. Mechanically it’s immobilize and hold are bog standard Blaster stats. It’s got a fairly mundane build-up and sustain powers.

 

In short, other than the bow graphics there is absolutely nothing that makes the set stand out from the rest of the Blaster secondaries except of course that it has no melee attacks at all.

 

Letting it have the 80’ range on the net and ice arrows would give it something to make it stand out from Fire’s DoT or the more stackable debuffs of sets like Dark or Atomic or Cold.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

2 hours ago, Super Homer said:

Check out Psi Blast for Corruptors and Defenders. The attacks have 100ft range instead of 80ft. The snipes 175 instead of 150.

The blaster version is messed up and they should fix that.

Regardless, my point that Psi doesn't have to be the only set with "extended" range (I mean, really, we're asking for it to be the same range as an ordinary primary attack) stands.

 

Tac Arrow lacks a cohesive shtick like Fire's damage over time or Dark's to-hit debuffs. I suggest that Range makes just as much sense as its shtick as any of those, particularly since it only brings it to the same range as the Archery primary and relies entirely on ranged attacks with no melee options in the mix.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

1 hour ago, Wavicle said:

Have you played it or is all of this based on just reading the notes?

Played it. Spent considerable time trying to work around the changes... ultimately decided I'd probably just shelve my Archery/Tac Arrow rather than go through all the work since the needed changes to my build only actually fully work at level 30+.

 

The changes aren't good and are fundamentally changing the way you have to play the set.

 

Even worse... the things that have ultimately been nerfed AREN'T what these changes imply. The actual nerfs to my build? Making it more annoying to exemp below 30, about 10 million influence to swap out enhancements for ones to counteract the changes and a serious doubt as to whether I even want to bother with the changes on Live over shelving it and rolling yet another Scrapper because at least they aren't completely changing the way my sets on them play.

 

The funny thing is we already have an example of a secondary set with more range (mental manipulation) and secondary debuffs (honestly, I didn't know "range" was considered mental's schtick until it was brought up here... I thought -recharge was its thing based on the secondary effects of Mind Probe, Psychic Scream and Psychic Shockwave).

 

There is NO reason for extra range to be exclusive to psychic, particularly when psychic has other secondary effects (the aforementioned -recharge), given that Tactical Arrow has no specific shtick to it other than using bow animations. Atomic has -Def, Darkness -ToHit, Electric -End, Fire has DoT, Cold has -Speed... but what is Tac Arrow's special?

 

I vote its special should be RANGE.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

4 hours ago, Wavicle said:

I've seen multiple people saying they won't take Oil Slick on their Blasters and I'm just completely baffled by that.

It’s pretty simple and two-fold;

 

A) one of the two powers merged was only ever slotted with just its base slot and the merged power will use all the slots from the other and really need an extra one to meet the performance of the original two... as a result, you can only slot Oil Slick by pulling from other powers you’ve previously slotted.

 

B) unlike the rest of the set, Oil Slick Arrow targets the ground rather than a target. If you’re like me, a person who steers using the old Doom-era arrow keys, then constantly moving between the keyboard and mouse to drop the Slick makes it more trouble than its worth, particularly in light of the first issue which means its not even a super-effective power when it is used.

 

Yes, powexec_location can help (and binding the new /interact command will be a godsend for me), but it’s still quite discordant from the rest of the set.

 

So, I just snagged a single-slot Stealth for a fifth LotG IO and called it a day since I can flip it on when I need more -Per than just Flash Arrow provides.

 

Basically, the Blaster version of Oil Slick Arrow just isn’t good enough to warrant rebuilding an existing toon to take advantage of it.

 

If you wanted a t9 everyone would take; give us a “Boost Range” toggle that moves all those 60’ powers up to the same 80’ that’s on live.

 

Better yet, put ESD Arrow back to hold, make IT the t9 and put in Boost Range as the t8.

[Power replacements when powers get re-ordered]

Yeah, I can confirm from testing out Tac Arrow that it just swaps the current power for the replacement automatically and leaves the slotting unchanged, even if said slotting is useless for the power (ex. Acrobatics became Oil Slick Arrow three-slotted with Luck of the Gambler).

 

Changes this extensive always came with a freespec on Live and I’m hoping they will here too. I don’t care how cheap people think respecs are... they aren’t free and if you’re level 41 and out of respecs you’ve got a long wait for another free one so you’re down to running a gimped build until you can gather the resources for a paid one (i.e. run a respec trial or get enough merits/influence to buy a respec recipe).

 

I suspect the majority of players don’t do the market mini-game so getting 50 merits or however many million inf they go for on the auction house isn’t trivial.

 

These changes definitely call for granting everyone a freespec when it goes live.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

3 hours ago, Blackbird71 said:

The problem with slotting for range is that it removes the option to slot a full set for bonuses.  Depending on the sets used, this can have a significant impact on a /TA blaster's overall defense numbers and strategy.  So either way, the reduced range impacts /TA survivability.

Yes, and I've said as much. As of this build if you remain at mostly level 29+ you would lose the 6 piece set bonus off of two powers.

 

In my case that was -2.5% ranged defense, -1.25 energy/negative defense (thunderstike) and 1.88% off my AoE defense (entomb); all my positional defenses are higher than my fire/cold defenses so there's no loss there... and I dropped the chance for +absorb from the Entomb set.

 

But then I also swapped out other sets so I gained in some and lost in others... Going from Annihilation (one 6 slot and one 5 slot w. KB>KD) to Artillery (two full sets) and another LotG (in stealth which I took in place of Oil Slick Arrow) netted me -2.7% max endurance (I have so much its irrelevant), -4.5% energy/negative resistance, -4% regeneration (-20+16), -6% endurance discount, -3.75% AoE defense, +8.22% ranged defense, +6.88% energy/negative defense, +4% damage, +18% accuracy and +7.5% recharge.

 

The ranged and energy defense improvements from the set swapping more than cancel out the losses from the sixth slot of thunderstrike and I'm down a bit of AoE defense, but it's still pretty high overall and my high energy/negative (which you see a lot of high levels) defenses handle a LOT of that too (sappers and carnies are cake).

 

It's NOT my preferred trade by any means... I had to do a lot of number crunching and experiments on Test to get the numbers I got and other people are going to have to do their own calculations because I've got a very particular single-target DPS focused build; others will have different priorities.

 

However, we need to look at hard numbers when trying to present options and alternatives.

 

For example, I can now say with certainty that this change will have negligible impact on my play style beyond making exemping to very low levels less appealing and costing me a bunch of influence (a one-time expense). It will make me slightly squishier in some ways and a little tougher in others. It will have almost no impact on the damage and lockdown distance or duration of ENA and barely any on Ice Arrow.

 

I can then easily point out that "discourage exemping" and "one-time influence cost" aren't really good nerfs to the set relative to leaving the range alone and chopping the immobilize duration in half which would then force an actual playstyle choice between full t1 damage (slotting for damage) or immobilizing as long as live currently does with no slotting at all (slotting for immobilize) because you can no longer get both at full strength.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

Okay, so I ran some numbers in test including the effects of set bonuses

 

- For comparison, the primary 80' range becomes 88' with a +10% range set bonus (ex. Superior Blaster's Wrath) or 96' with +20% (Superior Blaster's Wrath + two Barrage +5% set bonuses).

- The 60' range with no slotting for range becomes 66' with +10% range set bonus and 72' with a +20% set bonus.

- The numbers below are for 1 and 2 slotting 50+5 Range IO's into the powers with no set bonus, +10% set bonus and +20% set bonus).

 

Level 32-50

1 IO: 79.13' (none), 85.13' (+10%), 91.13' (+20%)

2 IO: 93.94' (none), 99.94' (+10%), 105.94 (+20%)

 

Level 29

1 IO: 77.08' (none), 83.08' (+10%), 89.08' (+20%)

2 IO: 92.31' (none), 98.31' (+10%), 104.31' (+20%)

 

Level 19

1 IO: 69.93' (none), 75.93' (+10%), 81.03' (+20%)

2 IO: 79.85' (none), 85.85' (+10%), 91.95' (+20%)

 

Level 7 (lowest possible via Oroboros)

1 IO: 63.17' (none), 69.17' (+10%), 75.17' (+20%)

2 IO: 66.35' (none), 72.35' (+10%), 78.35' (+20%)

 

From my observations... one IO + Superior Blaster's Wrath keeps you within 5' of your primary attacks (and above 80' overall) down to level 29. Two IO's + Superior Blaster's Wrath keeps you within 3' of your primary attacks (and above 80' overall) down to level 19.

 

If you spend a lot of time exemping down to do Posi, Synapse and Yin then if these ranges go through I'd recommend two maxed range IO's in the powers. If you only rarely drop below 29 then a single range IO in each will mostly fix the range differential unless you're the type who sidles right up to the edge of max range and doesn't open with ENA or Ice.

 

Another aspect to consider if getting the ranges as equal as possible is the goal might be slotting two basic 50's in place of 50+5's since that would put your numbers between the slightly too short 1 maxed IO and the slightly too long 2 maxed IOs.

 

So, I'm still going to say this would be a LOT less complicated if the ranges were just 80' and other things were nerfed, precisely because I don't think the goal of these changes is for Tac Arrow players to start doing in-depth build analysis for smoothing out differential ranges with minimal losses to set bonuses. 

 

If you want to consistently reduce performance, nerf something that's harder to compensate for. For example, right now it is very easy to slot the ENA for damage because its base immobilize duration is more than long enough for blasters to lock down a mob until you've dealt with everything else.

 

If you cut the base duration in half though, now there's a meaningful choice between slotting for damage (making it basically another T1 attack with a short duration immobilize) or slotting for immobilize (half the damage of your primary damage slotted attacks, but control back around the live base range values) and whichever way you slot it, you've got a fairly substantial nerf to its performance.

[Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp]

1 hour ago, Keen said:

Thank you so much for this! Hoping that eventually other Stealth powers get the same treatment (like Hide for Stalkers maybe 😄 )

This will be enough to get me to re-roll what was supposed to be a Dual Pistols/Devices Blasters, but not being able to see my costume at all due to the sustain led me to drop and re-roll with other secondaries a couple times before ending up switching ATs entirely to a Traps/DP Defender.

 

Honestly? Half the problem with some of the sets isn't the mechanics, its the god-awful graphic choices (which, to be fair, were not typically made by our current devs) like making all your costume choices worthless because you're perpetually invisible even to yourself unless you deliberately debuff yourself for purely cosmetic reasons.