Galaxy Brain

I'd love this, and other things more related to non-direct combat... but I think that ship has sailed for CoH at this point in time 😞

Ki Push is really fun, but its not KB... well at least till the end. It's a repel and a hold iirc before it ends up knocking the enemy at the end of it.

They usually say something in the NPC channel

Yeah, that sort of pettiness is stupid and should be shunned. It should really be more communication than instantly jumping to "Imma boot you / Imma leave the team". Like, if it is frustrating you that another player keeps knocking enemies around in a manner that feels disorganized, why not throw out "Hey, lets blast those guys into the wall!" or something to that effect to let the KB users leverage their powers without attacking them for doing so / booting them? If the person still doesn't want to cooperate or actively begins to act against the team then I don't see it as any different than other players who do similar things like pulling other groups on purpose just to cause chaos, actively door sitting, or otherwise being uncooperative to the team. As an energy blast player, I try to leverage knocking enemies about into the map since it is often the best course of action to line up further attacks, and generally splatting into something means they smear down the wall / etc or can get stuck which effectively becomes a hold vs them where they cant fight back. To me, scattering enemies about randomly is dangerous since then I have to divert attention and cannot leverage further AoE attacks as effectively. VS a single target I don't care as that guy is getting wrecked by me specifically, and I find that is usually the case even in the craziest of teams where either people die too fast to even notice one guy being flung into the sunset, or if one guy is flung they see they are also getting blasted to heck so they move on. The only time that sucks is if the environment is wide open and my Explosive Blast flings everyone everywhere which can cause issues solo (my bad there since I had full control, and from the right angle they don't go "everywhere"), and depending on the map cause more chaos than intended in a team. As a Blaster, I had never had anyone say anything about KB to me since I will leverage it as hard control when possible, or the things I attack just die anyways so its a win-win. That said, it took a bit to learn the best way to use knockback attacks and how to angle yourself / etc for the best effects that many players may not have had the time to play with yet. That is where the communication piece comes in that it seems is lacking as based on the sentiments here is either my way or the highway on both sides... Anywho, back on the original topic I feel that this should really be twofold. 1) Yes, at this point there are probably enough power combos that warrant there being a universal KB -> KD IO or some other option as an option. 2) On the flip-side, KB is fun and I still want to heavily campaign in favor of buffing it it be truly a cool effect. Touching on what I said about my blaster, KB can be very powerful and if it came with Stuns / More Damage / Etc then I feel that people who know how to use it already just benefit even more, and those who are learning how to use it best have a ton more leeway in terms of providing team utility where they are still defeating foes quickly or providing layers of safety to offset the cases where a frustrating interaction may occur. 2.5) Given the last two points, I feel any KD conversion / option should be nerfed in that it does not get the KB benefits, whatever they may be. Sure, some powers like Bonfire may not benefit from KB still given how it works. But then look at say, Force Bolt where slotting for KB suddenly makes it really really good, and everything in between where it becomes a tactical choice of which you want which gives value to the individual IOs and the "Global" option.

Oh I know it was a joke, but still it is pervasive that it is only an issue for melee characters.

It's not just melee characters that are effected tho. You think characters with placed effects like if enemies are taken out of said effects? As for @GM Arcanum I agree 100%!!! KB as it stands is not where it should be for a superhero game. Launching dudes should feel good, and be effective in combat rather than being questionable.

Or alternatively boot you. I hate how this causes division

So then it's not ok for them in turn to ask you to follow their plan and instead be forced into abiding by your actions.

Which in turn means you force them to play your way tho, with you knocking enemies however you decide. Actively scattering mobs just to be difficult is also annoying when many of the abilities rely on that not happening... at least if you don't have control over it (from the other player's perspective). I think the crux of the "problem" is that while awesome, Knockback is not in a controlled state outside specific powers and is very easy to "misuse": Experienced player using force bolt to ram the boss into a corner and keep them pinned? Awesome and great use of KB, but can be a bit boring as each fight becomes "let me scope out the best geometry to abuse". New player using force bolt and flinging the boss everywhere into other mobs and causing a ton of chaos? Can be fun, but can also quickly be frustrating. Experienced player using an AoE knockback power while hovering above the fight at a certain angle to try and control the RNG that the attacks sends enemies at? Again, great usage but requires a bunch of finesse and time that other effects don't need (or if you convert to KD....). New player using AoE knockbacks as fast as they come up with no regard to enemy placement? Fun! But, then you spread out enemies away from melee auras needed for survival or from control patches, other AoEs, etc, and make the combat more dangerous. I would love if KB were awesome to use the way its sort of intended. Throw that M80 grenade into a mob, and see people go flying everywhere, through walls, bounce off each other, and leave only the stronger enemies standing. Unfortunately, knockback in CoH is not that. KB is not usually a *bonus* since it objectively slows down combat in most scenarios when it comes to grinding up a bunch of mobs. The M80 grenade that bounced people off walls doesnt get bonus damage for the impact of the enemy being flung, so Fireball is infinitely better for just having more DoT to kill enemies faster without scattering them out of the way. Enemy AI also heavily favors them just dog-piling you anyways, so even if you fling enemies around they will get up and rush you again which reinforces the behavior. Not to mention that the availability of Knockdown as a direct "competitor" to Knockback is tough to beat. So, what can we do to keep things superheroic and fun? As I mentioned prior, giving Knockback more oomph to make it that show stopping, room clearing effect that it should be is one. But I think looking into the KB powers that exist needs to be done as well when it comes to the % Chance and Mag of knocks. The enemy AI could be more varied as well, with more behaving like Praetorian Clockwork where they favor spreading out anyways instead of just rushing you, which reinforces the herding behavior. Though the prevalence of taunt auras and control effects also enforce this... on top of the spawns of enemies naturally being grouped up too. In short, its sort of the nature of the game to where KB is usually detrimental, and I believe if that is the case it should be buffed to be the true benefit it should be.

So, its ok to scatter enemies everywhere to mess with other people's abilities?

Just throwing darts at the wall here: Problem: Complexity & RNG Opportunity currently is hard to understand for many players as it has 2 different states activated by 2 different powers. You can skip one of these, but then many feel as though you cannot given you lose out on "half" the inherit. You also have to build meter in order to activate your inherit via the T1 or T2 power, but then that has problems where you actually have to hit said power to activate. There are times when the power straight up misses, or when the target is suddenly not available / is killed as you fire that cause lots of problems when trying to plan out your opportunities that just cause frustration. The "core" of the inherit is great still. Sentinel Attacks naturally having bonus -Res/Def on hit is nice, and the ability to single out 1 target for bonus -Res / Other effects is also great. Seeing that target pop under somebody is just fun, and feels great when you get the bonus stats. Its just how you get it feels off. Suggestions: Going the simpler route, here is how I would at least try and streamline the current model: When your opportunity meter is full, your next (ST?) attack becomes auto-hit and will trigger opportunity as long as it activates. This will eliminate the issue of missing opportunity either through RNG accuracy, or the target being blocked / killed by a 3rd party and robbing you of the buff. I say any (ST) attack to make it easier to manage, but making it either the T1 or T2 attack could also work. This also allows for the "Accuracy" theme of a sentinel to come into play as you can get a guaranteed attack every so often. Combine the Defensive and Offensive opportunity modes into one opportunity buff. Feedback on these modes is that they do not seem super game changing on their own. Combining them into one "super mode" along with an easier way to set it up would be nice! If too strong, either the numbers could be rolled back a bit while still being combined or the duration shortened a bit. I'd rather the latter so the loop could be building up to your "Opportune Moment" and taking advantage every so often. While opportunity is active, ST attacks can place the "Marked Target" debuff on any target for the duration, but you can only have 1 marked target at a time. The Marked Target idea is really cool... but often wasted. Simply allowing you to mark 1 enemy at a time while in Opportunity Mode would be much more intuitive and let you and team mates benefit from the enemies you focus on. Being able to toss out the -20% (25% with base opportunity stacked?) more freely will also boost the damage output, on top of the endurance discount from the combined opportunities. I think the current model works as a "core", but streamlining how you use it would go a long, long way to improvement. Being able to reliably set up the opportunity buff (and debuff) both for yourself and allies to take advantage of will bring damage up a good deal over time and make for a more cohesive gameplay loop imo.

My guess is to limit the damage output of MMs personally given they can do amazing DPS with the pets for technically 0 cost, while simultaneously using support powers. That said, it puts the attacks in a weird, weird spot. They do little damage cus of AT mods, cant really be used to make a chain, and as mentioned cost a lot. This makes attacks outside of the demon whips for the -Res sorta not worth using. I'd argue for them to have much longer recharges instead and beef up the damage and secondary effects. Using the few attacks an MM has should at least have sudden impact in a battle since they cannot be relied on for DPS.

@boggo2300, @Redlynne, at least give a bit more than that lol.

The #1 appeal of MMs is getting a whole squad to roll with. Thats gonna be a big no for removing that.

It doesn't feel powerful here is the root of the problem! Knockback into a wall / off a ledge / 50 ft through the air should feel impactful in some way. Currently, it doesn't outside of RNG glitching into the environment which is not reliable and can actually be detrimental if they fly out of bounds and can't be hit. If when you flung everyone across the room and all the minions get KO'd, and the LTs + are either stunned or at least take high damage / take much longer to get back up then people would at least appreciate the cool factor, or even try and leverage the direction they fling people. The issue IMO is that KB does not offer substantial benefits over other Knock-Powers, which opens up the comparison. Knockdown / Knockup keeps enemies generally in the same spot which meshes well with the normal combat of the game and allows the various AoEs that like enemies bunched up to do their thing. Knockback pushes enemies out of those zones and is something that other players then have to react to, which can be frustrating without coordination. So of course, conversion to knockdown keeps most of the benefit of KB without the frustrations, a win-win. If the choice was between "Ok, soft control that keeps people in place VS hard control that makes them go boom and we win", then this would probably be a different conversation. Another point though is that I don't think it is productive to just say "All knockback is bad". Specifically, it is AOE KB that is disruptive. A ST KB attack can be leveraged easily by a player to wreck their target of choice or even save a teammate's butt. In general, its sort of accepted that if you are ST KB'ing a guy they they're your target to handle. When its an AoE though, if not aimed correctly you can scatter a group to the 4 winds which can disrupt the abilities of several other team mates at once whether it be a melee AT needing to reposition, or another AT that has to choose which new sub-group to AoE or where to place a targeted effect. On top of all that, IIRC most AoE KB is also RNG on whether it knocks or not. If AoE knocks were mini-nukes like they are often shown in media (those powers typically clear the room of mooks and end the fight) then they would be a welcome / cool sight to see all the defeated enemies thrown about rather than an annoyance. I think this all really comes down to evaluating the AoE KB powers as they are not all the same, nor the sets that have them. Fire Control only has 1 for example, and it becomes godlike with KD. Energy Blast? Way different and its all RNG outside 1 power.

Right, which is why I've been wanting to actually buff knockback so that it is worth the extra learning curve and inconsistency. If KB always had a 5 sec get up time, or did more damage, or stunned too, something besides what KD already does but with range it'd help with these problems.

This is unreliable, if it happened every time it'd be groovy

They... already are? Tier 1 is 3 pets, Tier 2 is 2, Tier 3 is 1

I'd like the thrown weapon set to be like the claws of blast sets. Have an endurance discount but possibly no traditional damage boost. As for earth blast/manipulation, what would be its secondary effect?

If AI cannot change based on level, then I am fine with the tradeoff. Have your pet GoTo melee if you wanna use the robopunch

Also, no to a purple set. That is 50 only.

Increasing the pet level is one of those nice buffs that just put a lot of sets on an even playing field imo, and removes some annoyances with say... minion frailty a bit.

See my above post and linked thread

I mean sure, but that is still one of the newer "legacy" pieces.

Theres tons of stuff, new and old. Look at the cosmic corsair arms when you hold weapons :P