ParagonKid

Because I'm tired of that being hung over SS as some kind of threat that the powerset will suddenly stop being earth-shatteringly overpowered. Because it's not. Like I said, I have no fear over then "ruining" Rage or SS because I refuse to touch them already. That boogyman holds no sway anymore; HC team saw to that. It's been how many years now they could have proliferated the set? I call the bluff. I'm double-dog daring them to port SS to Scrappers.

I used to think like that. But then I decided that I can't stand to play SS in its current form anymore and no longer care to excuse how HC has handled it. There's zero downside if they ruin it further if one is already not engaging with the set at all, yes? Latest issue being really underwhelming only brought that simmering discontentment to the forefront, especially with nothing else to distract from it.

Prove it. I've got data indicating it's very middle of the pack. You've got nothing.

In general, for single targets you fire off the powers in order of highest 'damage per activation time'. For SS that's usually simply running down the attacks in order strongest to weakest: KO Blow, Haymaker, Punch, Jab. If KO Blow finishes recharging before you get to Jab, for example, you'd execute KO Blow, then the next strongest attack that's available..

It's a better metric than the nothing you've produced to support your position.

It is a quantitative assessment based on the best performance data the community has harvested. You're the one dealing in subjective feelings.

Pretty damn good isn't good enough for having tacked on penalties while other melee sets are better yet don't have those.

More that they're victims of spread misinformation. They could also prefer to roll sets for RP reasons, or are just completing one of every powerset combo, or go in with eyes open but are hoping the set gets fixed one day. I imagine those would be the major reasons, but not all of them. Regarding removing the penalty: The penalty has 3 components to it. Only one of them affects DPS. Removing the other two, while leaving the damage penalty, would go towards making the set more fair without increasing performance. Alternatively, removing the damage penalty *would* increase performance, AND would make the other two penalty components more justified in remaining.

Absolutely it does. If you have Powerset A that does X giggleflops of damage per second and Powerset B that ALSO does X giggleflops of damage per second, but Powerset B also punches you in the nose, that's not balanced; why would any sane person pick Powerset B ever?* You either reduce A's damage, increase B's or remove the punches. The response "the punches ain't so bad' speaks more to your poor understanding of balancing than mine. To further illustrate my point with your own example of Staff: Staff sacrifices damage for the flexibly of the Stances mechanic. If Staff did X giggleflops of DPS and kept the Stances, why would you not pick Staff always? Conversely, to be balanced, SS ought to gain superior damage over sets that do not have a built in crash/penalty because it HAS a crash/penalty. You balance a pro with a con, and a con with a pro. SS has a con, but no pro compared to other sets which do as good or better. *The answer in the case of Super Strength is that people pick it because they are told to ignore the numbers and overlook the penalty by people who don't really know anything.

This is Ston's Melee AT Archetype comparison. It is slightly old, but unless you have any newer numbers to present, it's the best thing to refer to. For single target damage, Super Strength comes out about middle of the road. Trapdoor runs, which gauged AoE performance but are invalid now, bring it up a bit in the rankings on everage. Either way, it is considered S Tier alongside Fiery Melee, Savage Melee, Axe, TW, Martial Arts etc. It is considered comparable to them for damage output and "worth". So what's the problem? You know what those sets DON'T have that SS does? A crash. A built in drawback. Why should Super Strength have a crash for the non-advantage of performing with around the same effectiveness as sets that are both better than it in some ways, but have no built in penalties themselves? It really shouldn't. But it does. That is why SS is "bad". Because it pays a price for mediocrity. It is taxed more for doing the same as other power sets. And this is a totally fixable problem. You either raise its damage output to warrant a penalty being in place, or you remove the penalty. Relatively straight forward. Except for the fact nobody will lift a finger to fix it, but instead doubled down on it when they did have the chance to fix it and then left SS to wallow. Which is why I'll always advise anyone asking to not engage with SS unless they absolutely need that specific flavor. Because the only good reason to take the set in its current state is for RPing.

You can combine 3 Awaken inspirations into a Super Awaken which revives you with a Phase Shift active.

Which is only fair given how they're treating the negative feedback to this unasked for and unwanted change.

The Council didn't need "flavor" mechanics. The Council was vanilla. The Council was ordering chicken strips, which is is something that pretty much every restaurant offers as a safe choice. People overwhelmingly PREFERRED the Council for this reason. But for someone on the development team, this was untenable, I guess. And, again, nobody should have to provide proof and make an airtight case for a change to NOT go through. The default action shouldn't be the developers changing things after decades that don't need changing. There is no 'qui tacet consentire videtur' . The onus should be on the developer putting forward the change for successfully justify it. That is how good designers operate, as opposed to people just playing in a sandbox doing whatevert they want to.

Eh. That's not how it works. Almost nobody asked for the changes, the majority of players will not like these changes, but most of them will quietly eat the stink sandwich or go elsewhere. That's how it goes every update that has bad changes that they're adamant about pushing out because it suits them.

They do not have to team with 7 other players who are Incarnates. THAT is their option to control the difficulty. Why should my gameplay change to solve their problem? When someone walks into a room full of people and says "I'm cold" while everyone else is comfortable, and then turns up the heat rather than put on a sweater, that makes them the one in the wrong. If someone wants to jack up the thermostat and tell everyone else to strip if they don't like it, they're the unreasonable jerk. Everyone else aren't jerks for wanting the room to stay as it is.

Nobody is locked into teaming with Incarnates, either. If you don't like how fast your team steamrolls, find a different team. Changing mobs to correct a problem that can be solved by the choices of the player with the problem and force everyone else to change just to please THEM, is ludicrous. To paraphrase Tom Petty, "you don't need to change what don't need to change".

What you can do draw is attention to the changes after they drop and try to snowball any player discontent into something then. This is not the place to effect change; that is not the game that is played here.

We have content specifically intended for teams; Taskforces. And we have hard Taskforce modes now specially for teams where support ATs want to feel needed. So there is obviously where these mobs belong. But don't be surprised if not a ton of people engage with that content. Because as much as some people want the claim the masses are crying out for greater difficulty, the clear popularity of Council PI Radios as they exist Live currently betrays what most people actually go for.

The onus should not be on anyone to justify why an arbitrary change to existing content that most people didn't ask for, should not be made.

Very much this. If this change to Council and CoT has been made because it has become obvious most people choose to engage with content like Council radios, ya know, that should be an undeniable indicator of what most people want. Because I'm sure most people don't want to fight a boss twice because it rezzed and then have it transform into a wolf so you can fight it a third time. And do it multiple times each spawn it seems. The alternative being, they're forced to lower the difficulty settings they've always used because one day someone else arbitrarily decided to change the existing content out from under them. But that's only if one cares what most people want. Personally, I know defacto nerfs to my characters aren't what I look forward to in upcoming patches.

I feel a control set that does not stack useful debuffs, or have any unique mechanics to interest people, probably needs to be on par with Fire Control for damage output to be competitive.

Bruising is simply a component of Gauntlet that was present when the game shut down, which was now removed. The "Gauntlet" we have now isn't the same as far as I'm concerned. Arguing semantics accomplishes nothing except trying to antagonize. Increased arc/AoE sizes means little to several powersets and even for those it does not, it mostly only applies to farming. I don't care if I'm outdamaging Brutes in some edge cases more than I care that I do less damage than I used to and that my Tanker was undermined by an unwarranted nerf and unwanted change masquerading as something else. "But doing less damage than before, theres just no way." Don't try to gaslight me.

I have not touched my Tanker since they removed Gauntlet. I don't care what they said about "most cases" benefiting from the damage mod change; my tanker does less damage now. Setting that betrayal aside, Tankers are over-specialized and have no flavor or compelling identity. They are worse Brutes with excess survivability which they are punished for.

I suspect very little thought went into crafting Super Strength, just due to priorities being elsewhere. The animations for Jab, Punch and Haymaker were all recycled from the weapon sets. Even the alternative animations that were added later were swiped from elsewhere.

What exactly will Tankers have over Brutes following these changes?