Sovera

IR carries Rad Melee like Burn carries/carried Fire Armor. But where Fire Armor is having a pass Rad Melee is just being straight up nerfed. Imagine Fire Armor having Burn fixed but not being tweaked like it is now. I would suggest not touching IR until ready to give Rad Melee a do over. I imagine the set can be salvaged with animation tweaks or perhaps altering the Contaminated mechanic.

Testing the new new changes. Same Fire Armor/Martial Arts character: Pylon, Burn that spawns a second burn patch when FE is up, Fiery Embrace used: 5:26 5:45 Times on live: 4 minutes 4:56 4:37 4:55 4:34 Trapdoor test: 5:43 5:51 Times on live: 6 minutes. As mentioned in the previous test Burn is not particularly affecting ST damage if this was the intent. Maybe animation shaving on top of this will help since each of the changes separate removes about 30 seconds from the test. Perhaps before adding it to the PTS someone on the private test server could test adding 10/15 seconds to FE and see the results? Heck, I'll do it if someone points me where to sign up.

Current Burn does damage and then makes a patch of fire appear under each enemy in range. Since all the patches hit everyone it makes every enemy take damage from multiple patches. Then the mechanics also made damage procs fire a second time. Now Burn does damage and then summons just one burn patch. Damage was upped to offset this and tests so far show that the AoE clear is almost the same as before (despite the doom and gloom). On the other hand the single target damage has suffered greatly with the difference between current and test server being about 50% less damage. For a character, not 50% less for Burn. Beta testing is still ongoing so devs might still do something about this.

Preach it. Adding Burn to the rotation can many times help to sub a weaker attack or even fix rotations that have gaps such as EM. I'm not condoning it, but I do understand the desire for an AoE to remain for AoE uses. So far we have an obvious knob to increase ST damage so we will have to wait and see what the devs want to try. At worst they just might decide it's fine as is but that's speculation and pessimism rolled into one.

Well, I'm a huge fan of Fire Armor if no one guessed it. But I don't farm. Not sure where I sit in that bullet list. So far what we do have is the usual 'reads-the-patch-notes-and-immediately-and-loudly-complain-about-X' crowd doing their usual shenanigans. Tested so far the changes to Burn did not affect (much) the clearing time of missions. It did affect the ST damage though by lowering the ST damage by as much as 50%. Which is brutal. But the beta testing is not finished yet and I expect that there might be more revisions down the line (hopefully).

I just peeked at the detailed info instead of checking City of Data, but And yeah, there are some bits and bobs that add both QoL and a bit more survival (max HP from new Consume marry well with more regen from Temp Protection), but it's still not a bastion of survival. As I tested above Burn still adds decent AoE and goes well with poor/late AoE sets, and Fiery Embrace adds a nice chunk of ST damage. But the set has degraded from 'squishy but the offense based armor'. At this point both Stone Armor or Bio will add more ST and Rad Armor adds more AoE (but Fire Armor still bridges the gap by doing both). Beta testing isn't over though so let us wait for the next round (do wish we had a bit of communication going but I can understand the devs growing jaded and cynical when they try).

Yeah, but without putting too much emphasis into it it's also a point made in bad faith. This mythical scenario implies the build has zero recharge slotted (it's Burn, it's an AoE, people will want it slotted for recharge), no global recharge, no Hasten, and the immobilize protection lasts 1:40 minutes anyway so even in that scenario Burn would be back before the immobilization protection had worn off.

No? The recharge has been reverted.

The pull from Cyclone Axe is not affected by the Tanker inherent. At 21f the mob is untouched At 15f it does. This might be on purpose but then might want to add the info to the power such as other similarly not affected by the inherent powers also have.

Yes, backed by numbers preferably.

I'm not sure how useful this will be to anyone but I'm throwing more data: how much does Fiery Embrace add in terms of damage in practical terms? Same tests as before but not using Fiery Embrace at all. Fire Armor/Martial arts character. Previous tests with new Burn having shorter animation and 45 seconds recharge and using Fiery Embrace: 6:13 6:07 Previous test with new Burn with the old slow animation and 25 seconds recharge and also using Fiery Embrace: 5:54 Trapdoor, Build-up used, but not Fiery embrace: 6:27 6:16 I think it is safe to say the times are near the same with or without Fiery Embrace. The impact is small if it takes six minutes to shave 20 seconds. Previous pylon testing with new Burn, shorter animation and 45 seconds recharge, Fiery Embrace used: 5:27 with Burn used. 5:12 with Burn used. 5:36 without Burn used. 6:06 without Burn. 6:12 without Burn. Previous pylon test with new Burn, old animation and 25 second recharge, Fiery Embrace used: 6:10 with Burn 5:54 with Burn. Pylon test, Build-up used, no Fiery Embrace: 7:54 without Burn being used. 7:48 with Burn used. Large impact on ST damage. I think that this is actually pretty good. It compartmentalizes things. Added AoE is the responsibility of Burn and extra ST is the demesne of Fiery Embrace, ergo tweaks to ST or AoE have a knob so each facet of damage can be tuned up or down. It also finally bears some weight of my instinctive claim made in the past years that if Burn was touched then Fire Armor would crumble. As seen it was carrying near by itself all of the offense in the offensive armor. My suggestion is to leave Burn alone (the shaved animation would be nice but as seen it only helps in replacing the weakest attack. Without the animation being shaved it is not a gain to use in ST) since despite the kneejerk reaction at seeing it fixed/nerfed the changes made to it ensure it remains a good AoE addition that has (nearly) the same times as on live with the multiple procs. Instead touch up Fiery Embrace if desiring to give back ST damage to the set.

Yeah, I know, if it was meant for me I tested after the patch which is where the 30%-ish single target damage drop became 50% with the animations no longer shaved.

You are quite right. NPCs ought to keep the old Fire Breath. I suppose even for players there is some value in Fire Breath-ing once at the start of the fight (rather like the nuke you compare it to) and then ignore the power until the next spawn. Though I think players would rather have Fire Breath get the Frost treatment (I mean, I'm a player, so I count, right?).

I can see how the devs will reason that Burn is an AoE and so it should be something extra, a bonus, to help with the attack set it is paired with. But not to replace or be used for ST. If that is the reasoning I get it. But while I say the devs nerf with a gentle hand until things are adjusted this is currently a 50% damage loss on single target. Not 5% or 10%. And yes, it came from a bug, but also yes, it has been like this since... when? IOs were introduced? PPM was changed? Not one year or two years. Players picked Fire Armor and knew what to expect. The small bumps in defense and the QoL (while deeply appreciated) do not stop Fire Armor being picked for offense of which 50% is currently shaved. I have no special suggestions to make if they are even accepted since that 50% loss might be considered acceptable and/or warranted, but perhaps transfer more power to Fiery Embrace either by reducing the CD or increasing the effect?

What lives for 45 seconds though? Nearly nothing will take the full damage. Other than that quibble, yeah, why a 45 second duration? It's not a Caltrop effect and nearly nothing will take that damage. CoH is a fast game and upfront damage is desired.

I see what you mean. I only cast it when the circle lights up which was my faulty thinking that meant it was when I could re-cast it, but it's actually an indicator that the bar is full and a reminder for the player to use it. After retesting with this bit of info your maths seem to be on the spot since I could almost keep it perma for a decent bit but eventually just ran out of bar. You're absolutely correct and I'll go back and edit my posts.

Alright, copied my Sentinel to the PTS since, as mentioned, it already existed there. Same behavior with the bar recovering to full by the time Vulnerability has finished. This time I bring moving pictures. 50G6J2L.mp4

Testing again. Reverting the animation shaving has lowered the ST damage even more. Pylons: 6:10 with Burn 5:54 with Burn. Currently on live: 4 minutes 4:56 4:37 4:55 4:34 Trapdoor test: 5:54 Currently on live: 6 minutes. Previous test on the PTS showed 6 minutes-ish when not using Burn which tells me that with the animation reverted and the damage lowered Burn is no longer an improvement when used for ST but remains an extra AoE that AoE poor sets can use. Two extra minutes in ST is simple brutal but I have no suggestions to make. I'll just present the numbers.

It's possible. The character already existed in the PTS from a previous test so maybe that's what happened. I'll copy it from live again and test once more. Build being used:

No, re-tested. By the time Vulnerability ends and lights up the bar has refilled. I can provide a video if my word is not enough.

I may be mistaken then. I remember testing on a pylon, 3 minute fight, and always having it up. Let me check again so I'm not spreading misinformation.

Not only does it not stack but my own experience is that a single person is enough to keep it up 24/7 on a single target. Tbh not sure -why- it cannot stack from different characters. Not like Sonic Assault from different characters don't stack, or Rad, or Kins, or stuns/holds, or... It could have a diminishing returns flag to it. Like full effect from the first Sentinel, then half from a different Sentinel, etc.

The -regen does not do anything significant on regular +3 bosses. The power of regen is directly tied to the HP pool of the recipient and all mobs (except power related cases) have the same regen rate. Something that regenerates 100 HP over 10 seconds is neglibile over something that regenerates 1000 HP. That's an extra 1000 damage that needs to show up to beat a mob. Regular bosses have small HP pools and that is why -regen barely does anything to do since stopping those 100 HP is negligible (I'm using random numbers but can be tempted into diving into actual in-game numbers). With all of this said I too don't like all these effects being spread to the attacks. It means finding room to take more skills, then the slots for them (though if only taken for their special effect, be it summoning specters or applying -regen, then the slots can be reduced to a skeleton), then, important, the endurance to use them since MMs have an endurance tax. And last but least, the APM since most MMs will have their hands full keeping their idiot children alive (and yes, I may mean the minions or I may mean their team mates) to be using all their skills. I would definitely compromise on this and make all these special secondary effects (raising specters or applying - regen or -res) a stacking effect that any ONE skill can apply. Like that it means MMs can indeed take and slot ONE attack and inbetween healing and buffing and micromanaging pets, they can slip that one shot every once in a while not so much for the damage but for the special effect attached to it. But 'having' to take all three just does not seem to vibe well for the above mentioned reasons. This is my opinion.

While people complain about the devs I look instead at the community. Forum PvP has become a thing with pet peeves between players who snipe at each other whatever is being said, purposefully looking for malice in what is being said, aiming to one upmanship. Others will simply post gloom with petty passive aggressive comments literally adding nothing other than jibes aimed at the devs despite being worded in vague terms. Others yet will spend pages arguing back and forth about their feels and how their feels are important (which, I grant, they are, but time and place) and how numbers don't matter if their feels are not appeased. The inevitable arguing that devs are bad, changes are bad, server is dying because of them, fewer players, bad devs, when it's a fricking 17 year old game that has been back for a couple years. Fuck sake I play a new WoW expansion for 3-6 months and then vamoose to a new game but somehow HC devs bad, HC changes bad, because two years later the game/server does not have the same numbers of when it opened to the public. As much as I do dislike the purging of the feedback threads (and it is not actually purged, the devs can see it and read it, but by being hidden it stops the feels crowd to argue about it) we need not look much further than the last patch, and the patch before, and the one before, where people don't even test the MFing changes and cry out how nerfed they have been, AFTER GLOSSING OVER THE TESTS SHOWING THAT THEY WERE NOT. Pages of it! 20+ pages! Arguing back and forth! Attack type changes? Fie, even the travel power changes with TESTS BEING DONE AND NUMBERS SHOWN are still derided. The devs tried to keep a gentle hand and it did not work out so now we are under more draconian rules. Pleased I am not since as much as feedback talking about the experiences while testing things were important as much as I am above deriding the feels these remain important when driving a character which is testing changes. So yeah. am I happy with the Fire Armor? As the appointed 'fire armor guru', no, no I'm not. Of course Burn was bugged and had more power than it should. So it should be fixed, and now it does less damage as it was always meant to be doing. Or it should not be fixed and instead it has more recharge added to it so that it does biggo damage but more spaced. Instead we get a damage nerf and then on top of it a recharge addition. I don't expect this to go live as is but verily as others said above it smells of planned compromise. Lots of the patch is good. I could hardly point at much I would call bad. Some will definitely need and have tweaks, I've seen enough testing cycles to get a grasp of how things are run. Also, people need to stop confusing donations with payment. Payment is obligatory to have product. Donations are given out of the goodness of one's heart. Don't donate and then dangle it over someone's head, devs or RL people.

I posted this on the power levels thread but it fits here better: